


The Great Beyond Act III: Places Unknown

by ElsieGlass



Series: The Great Beyond [3]
Category: The Last of Us
Genre: Age Difference, Age Play, Alternate Canon, Barebacking, Blow Jobs, Bonding, Bounty Hunters, Coming of Age, Complete, Confessions, Dystopian, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, F/M, Father Figures, Father-Daughter Relationship, Fingerfucking, First Time, Firsts, Gore, Graphic Description, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Jealousy, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Sex, Misunderstandings, Nudity, Oral Sex, Orgasm, Original Character(s), Pandemics, Porn, Porn With Plot, Possessive Behavior, Post-Apocalypse, Post-Pandemic, Relationship(s), Smut, Spanking, Underage Sex, Violence, obscenity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-21
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:14:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 36
Words: 91,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22564579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElsieGlass/pseuds/ElsieGlass
Summary: My name is Ellie Williams, and my story begins and ends with one man. His name is Joel Miller. The details of the ending are written on a bounty and blame him. The thief of the world. A man lied to me but kept his oath to himself. He did good by doing bad. I’m a better person for it and I learned the truth about so many things.
Relationships: Ellie (The Last of Us)/Original Female Character(s), Ellie (The Last of Us)/Original Male Character(s), Ellie Williams & Joel Miller, Ellie Williams & Tommy Miller, Ellie Williams/Joel Miller, Ellie Williams/Tommy Miller, Ellie/Joel (The Last of Us), Ellie/Tommy (The Last of Us), Joel & Tommy (The Last of Us), Joel Miller & Tommy Miller
Series: The Great Beyond [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1589026
Comments: 191
Kudos: 172





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> This is Act III, the final act of [The Great Beyond,](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1589026) a ~300k-word three-act fan fic based on The Last of Us video game (2013) by the game development studio, Naughty Dog, a Bruce Straley/Neil Druckmann joint. 
> 
> If you missed Act I, Jackson, [ you can find it here.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22075489)
> 
> Act II, Big Drift, [ can be found here. ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22336039)
> 
> Act I and Act II recap below. 
> 
> The Great Beyond is a work of fan fiction based on The Last of Us video game (2013) by the game development studio, Naughty Dog, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony Interactive Entertainment. Additional names, characters, places, products, and incidents are either the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Certain characters, characterizations, incidents, locations, and dialogues were invented for purposes of dramatization. Any similarity to the name or actual character of any person, living or dead, or any product/entity/actual incident is entirely for dramatic purposes and not intended to reflect on any actual character, history, product, or entity.
> 
> Copyright (c) 2020 by Elsie Glass.
> 
> All rights reserved. 
> 
> ElsieGlassGlass@gmail.com
> 
> [Twitter @ElsieGlass20](https://twitter.com/ElsieGlass20)  
>  [Insta @realelsieglass](https://www.instagram.com/realelsieglass/)
> 
> Happy reading! Xo
> 
> Act I and Act II Recap
> 
> After a dangerous journey across post-apocalyptic America to track down the elusive Fireflies—a fifth column militia dedicated to finding a cure for the cordyceps pandemic—sixteen-year-old ELLIE WILLIAMS and her fifty-year-old guardian JOEL MILLER's mission was futile.
> 
> They landed in Jackson, Wyoming where Joel’s younger brother TOMMY MILLER ran a settlement with his wife MARIA. Despite Jackson’s comforts, Ellie struggled to fit-in among the rural homesteaders. During a mission outside the wire, Joel was shot by an unseen enemy, and his convalescence forged a deep rift between him and Ellie. While Ellie grew closer to Tommy, Joel grew closer to an obstinate widow EVE who was bent on marriage. 
> 
> Feeling threatened by Eve’s rivalry, Ellie fatally bit her, killing her in cold blood. Aware of the severe impending punishment for her crime, Ellie set-off to broker an alliance with Joel. Before she could reach him, she was captured by Tommy, who threatened to kill her in revenge for Eve’s death. Joel interceded, but at the standoff, a cloudburst overwhelmed Jackson’s dam, flooding it out. Swept away by the churning floodwaters, Ellie landed downriver where she spotted Tommy and Joel locked in a violent brawl. Joel plunged a knife into Tommy’s chest and fled with Ellie into the forest. 
> 
> After the wash-out, Ellie and Joel drifted easterly. The boundaries of morality, loyalty, and survival were tested as they encountered enemies and challenges along the way. Joel forged deeper emotional bonds with Ellie while she explored new romantic feelings for him. After holing-up in a well-appointed abandoned house, Joel became deathly ill with malaria and hallucinated about his past, drawing Ellie into them. During his recovery, he proposed to end drifting and to settle down, and Ellie accepted. 
> 
> Their plans were interrupted when bounty hunters—hired by the Fireflies in retribution for Joel’s murderous rampage at St. Mary’s hospital—stormed the house and captured them. Head mercenary SKANE revealed the chilling truth to Ellie—that Joel had slaughtered the Fireflies at St. Mary's hospital while she was anesthetized rather than allow them to sacrifice her for a cure since her immunity could only be cultivated by killing her. Feeling deeply betrayed and robbed of her agency, Ellie disavowed Joel.
> 
> The bounty hunters delivered Ellie and Joel to Providence, a hellish prison run by its cruel warden, EPH, whose role in the bounty was as a retainer. Ellie learned that Eph intended to double-cross the Fireflies and storm St. Mary’s with his own men to claim the cure for himself. While Ellie awaited transport, she befriended the other prisoners, including their leader BISHOP, whose dying wife had earlier entrusted her to deliver her final words.
> 
> During drills in the prison courtyard, Ellie was forced to watch Joel and the other prisoners brutally beaten, which set-off a monumental epiphany—that her sacrifice would’ve been in vain. She realized the world was sunk way too far into the depths of brutality and disorder for a cure to save it. While Ellie hatched a plan to rescue Joel, Providence was raided by the Fireflies, saving them from immediate death. Now read on!

PLACES UNKNOWN

ACT III OF THE GREAT BEYOND

BY ELSIE GLASS

Chapter One

“Where’s Joel?” I ask Candler, the thin ageless man who introduced himself as the head medic. “That’s none of your business,” he says. “And none of mine, either.”

“Are you a Firefly?” I ask, feverish and shivering, sitting on a padded examination chair. “No use asking me that,” he says. I assume he's a Firefly but he’s not wearing Firefly regalia like everyone else. His posture’s pristine but he doesn’t hold himself like militia. His manner’s quiet and efficient. He’s got fine cheekbones and a small thin mouth, and there’s no extra flesh on him, including his bony nose. His eyes are small, and his forehead’s high and intelligent. His skin’s unlined and tinged yellow-green from years of living inside. “Are you still looking for a cure?” I ask.

“There’s little use in asking me anything,” he says.

“Who do I ask?”

“It’ll all be settled soon enough,” he says and rolls himself in his wheeled chair to a sterilization cabinet along the far wall. He returns with an instrument tray of steel tools, swings down an overhead light, and examines my wounds. Relief mixes with anger. What took you so long, I yell at him silently. What if you’d never showed-up? What if Joel and I were still imprisoned in that squalid place of torture, death, and degradation? We’d be dead, you know. Never mind. What’s the use of bothering with hypotheticals? We’re alive. That’s all that matters.

After a long tough ride through rough country from Providence, the cavalry ended here, an Eighties-era subterranean concrete bunker with cold hard air and bright fluorescent lights. I was dunked into a steaming bath, deloused, dewormed, and dressed in clean clothes. They shaved down half of the back of my head. It had to be done. The hair back there was matted into one big filthy clump of dried blood and pus. After that, I was delivered to Candler who bent me over a table and dosed the fleshiest part of my hip with a large syringe of what he said were antibiotics.

“Just a little pressure,” he says and I feel the sharp burn of a needle along my wound. After a long minute, he starts prying-out the infected staples with a pair of surgical pliers, cleans everything meticulously, and sews my wound closed with suture thread. While I gather myself, he rolls himself back to the far wall and returns with a large tray of colorful vials, beakers, and blood collection tubes, which he sets on my lap. “Lucky we found you when we did,” he says. “I’ve never seen such butchery.”

“You don’t get out much, do you?” I ask sarcastically.

“Actually, I’ve never left. This is the only home I’ve ever known. I was born here, I was educated here, and I expect to die here.” He glances at the back of the lab to an open door that leads to his office, where earlier, he sat me down and asked a million questions, most of which I couldn’t answer. I'm an orphan, you know. “Roll up your sleeves,” he says and I cross my arms over my chest in a gesture of defiance. He wants something from me and I want something from him. “Please don’t make this hard,” he says.

“Tell me where he is,” I say, meaning Joel.

“I’ll have to call them if you don’t cooperate.”

“Is he safe?”

“You ask too many questions.”

“Is he safe?” 

“Do I need to call them?” He glances at a large intercom panel aside the blast door. “It won’t be pleasant for either of us.”

“Just tell me he’s safe.”

“He’s _comfortable_."

"Comfortable?"

"My job’s to preserve life, not take it. As long as he’s under my care, I’ll see to my oath. Roll-up your sleeves.” A wave of relief washes over me. I have no doubt Joel and I would’ve died from our infected wounds if the Fireflies hadn’t found us. I woke-up every morning with my mouth parched in fever, and my headaches were becoming more frequent and malicious. Joel must've suffered terribly, must’ve felt death breathing down his neck. The Fireflies saved us from certain death. I suppose they wouldn’t have hauled him back here if they didn’t plan on patching him up. This makes me feel a bit better so I roll-up my sleeves. He draws my arm across the armrest and tells me to make a fist. “Will it hurt?” I ask and he says, “I’ve been doing this longer than you’ve been born.” He draws a butterfly-winged needle from the tray and slides it to a bulging vein. Blood coils the glass serum tube. “Are you still working on a cure?” I ask.

“I’m working on a number of things,” he says dismissively. He fills the serum tubes and puts them in the tray. As he pulls out the cannula, the lab door swings open to the big woman from last night’s raid. She swaggers to my side, trailed by a knot of colossal Fireflies. The Deltas were big but these men could make two out of them. She’s in equestrian gear—leather field boots with gussets bracing her knees over dark breeches. A red fringed scarf loosely drapes her chest. Her long dark untamed hair hangs wild past her broad shoulders. “Look at what some hot water, soap, and clean clothes will do,” she laughs, warm and genuine. She takes me by the arm and leads me from the room into a long narrow hallway latticed in thin pipes. Towering Fireflies in pristine load-out and polished jump boots saunter past, swiveling their eyes below cleanly-shaved heads without moving their bodies. “Welcome to the Rock, little one,” she says. “You wouldn’t know me or my name unless Marlene or Tommy told you about me. I’m Lith.” No, no one mentioned her. Why would they?

–––––––

“Rest those legs,” Lith says to her iron-grey Dutch Warmblood. “Won’t be much further now. Tomorrow we’ll go soft.” She pulls his head against her chest and scratches the white star between his eyes.

They kept me at the Rock for a week where I slept in a clean dark silent subterranean bunker under warm blankets and clean sheets. After Providence, it felt like a luxury hotel. They woke me for hot meals, hot baths, wound care and antibiotics, and they let me sleep. My whole life, I was never allowed to sleep. I was always woken by shrill military academy bells, Jackson guard mount bells, or Joel pulling the blanket off of me. We departed the Rock a couple days ago on horseback, escorted by two Fireflies, Graf and Kitson. They’re both tall, dark-haired, olive skinned, and broad shouldered with boyish faces. Judging by the sun and the shadows, we’re headed west. I suppose they’re taking me back to Salt Lake City to finish the job Joel interrupted. He’s not with us. I suppose his wounds were much worse than mine and they’re keeping him at the Rock till he’s strong enough to travel. Then they’ll bring him to Salt Lake City to sort-out the bounty before he’s killed. It’s not something I like to think about but it’s all I think about, riding from dawn to dusk, mounted in front of Lith, and it’s all I think about every night when we bed-down in derelict barns among our horses, like right now.

I sit in front of a small log fire across from Graf and Kitson, their heads tipped close beneath wool beanies, studying maps mounted on folded cloth. Cold blue starshine cuts through the caved-in roof, casting the hay bedding in milky silver shafts. Beyond the barn’s walls, a brisk wind spins the creaky weathervane above the cupola. Two plump ducks roast over a steel digging shovel, the flame tongues crackling the fat. Under Lith’s order, I polish the horses’ tack-up with a rag greased in duck fat. I’m glad to be put to work. It distracts me from thinking about Joel.

Lith sets down feed for her Warmblood, and Graf and Kitson’s tall chestnut Morgans. She comes over to the fire, unzips her riding vest, and sits at my side. She unsheathes her large steel knife and whets the blade. Her hands are as large and tough as a man’s. “I noticed we’re heading west,” I say to her.

“Is that a fact?” she asks, her tone amused.

“Are we headed somewhere in particular?”

“Nowhere in particular.”

“Do we expect to?”

“We expect to.”

“Could I ask where?”

“You could.”

“I wouldn’t get an answer, would I?”

“You’re very perceptive.” She looks at me amusedly with small deep-set round black eyes. The shape’s friendly but the light’s cold, alert, and mean. Kitson pulls the steaming duck from the fire and slides them onto slabs. “Go on,” she says and nudges me toward Kitson. “He won’t bite.” I get up, take the slabbed duck from him, and return to her side. She deftly quarters it with her blade and hands me a wing, slicked in grease. I eat greedily. Now that my fever’s gone, my appetite’s returned with a vengeance. “Eat your fill, little one,” she says. “Starved you half to death at Providence. A foul place where God’s name couldn’t be spelled, written, or spoken. Death was too good for its warden. We left him to rot. To retreat on his belly.”

“What happened to the men?” I ask, meaning Bishop and the other prisoners.

“We found no men. Animals—in a slaughterhouse.”

“The prisoners?”

She scoffs. “Were they friends of yours?”

“What happened to them?”

“You don’t need to worry about them. We killed the whole lot of ‘em.”

I gasp. “Their lives weren’t yours to take! They were innocent men!”

Her eyes glint hard and bright. “Don’t you dare talk about innocent men taking innocent lives. You and the Smuggler—deliberately reckless.”

My heart skips a beat at the mention of Joel. “Where is he? What’ve you done with him?”

“What makes you think we have him?”

“I saw him!”

“Forget you saw him. He’s done enough harm. Filled your little head with big lies. Pounded it into your skull the sun rises every morning just for you and goes down at night for you to sleep. You’re worth nothing more than a fabled cure. Baffling we put so much stock in you.”

“It was Marlene,” I say. “It was her cause.”

“How such a smart woman got caught-up in such a foolish game I’ll never understand.”

“You knew her?”

“She was my protégé.”

“She acted in good faith,” I say.

“Good faith? Open your eyes, little one! Good faith won’t save you when you’re bleeding-out, starving, freezing to death in a cold ditch. What you need’s a warm jacket and a hot meal—and we’ve given you both.”

“You want me to thank you?”

“Such things are customary.”

“It’s your responsibility to keep me alive!”

She scoffs dryly. “And why’s that?”

“The cure.”

“The cure!” she laughs.

“You’re still looking, right?” I ask, daring her to correct me but she doesn’t respond. “Are you looking or not?” I continue and she whets her blade like she hadn’t heard me. Look, it’s not that I care about sacrificing myself for a cure anymore. I just want to know my fate. It’s as simple as that. Am I to be killed in the name of a cure or not? Every day, I wake-up not knowing where I’ll end-up or if I’m to live or die. There are a million variables at play here and this limbo will kill me.

I suppose the more I think about it, the more I realize there’s a reason I’m still alive. They wouldn’t keep me alive and tax their precious resources if there wasn’t a big payoff at the end. What’d be the point? They wouldn’t be doing this unless the reward was big enough to cover their time and energy. Whoever has the weapons has the power and the Fireflies have the manpower that needs it. I suppose they’re keeping me alive because someone at the end of this journey wants a crack at a cure and a vaccine. Someone more influential than Lith.

“There’s a reason I’m still alive,” I say. “Someone wants what I have. Someone at the end wants me.”

“Keep guessing,” she sneers. “Keep at it. The clearer things seem to you, the less you know.”

–––––––

We set-out the next morning under low shredded brooding skies. Anyone could see bad weather’s coming. I ride two-up with Lith. Graf and Kitson canter astride on their sleek Morgans, their thin red nostrils steaming the humid air. The sky pitches sickly dull green as the day unfolds, and the air hangs still and lifeless.

Midday we come to a rocky valley hemmed-in by high jagged hills and we follow a winding stream to the basin where we dismount and drape the reins over the horses’ heads. The north end of the valley rises to a sheer mountain range shredded in low ragged black clouds. A large complex of industrial offices and low-rise condos sits at its graveled foothills. All abandoned. You can tell by the absence of smoke skeins and the dark windows. In this kind of weather, you’d need both warmth and light, but there are no signs of either.

We lay over the bank on our bellies and sip water next to the lapping horses, their ears alert and their hooves playful. Kitson and Graf remove their ballistic helmets and pull maps from their plate carrier pouches. Graf grates his thick black hair and grooms his lush eyebrows framing his big brown eyes. Kitson shifts his M25 across his broad shoulders and scans the maps with his almond-shaped eyes. I’m warming to these men. They’re agile and unobtrusive. They only speak when commanded. They make me feel protected and safe.

Lith pats her horse’s neck. His alert ears prick back and forth. He snuffles, snorts, and skitters sideways. Odd behavior, but anyone could see her horse is a bit odd. A deep hollow rumble echoes across the mountaintops followed by a ferocious bellow. It sounds like the biggest deepest thunder I’ve ever heard but I realize it’s not thunder when a couple seconds later, a furious wind rushes past. The hair on the back of my neck stands-up. The earth jolts, heaves, rolls, and lifts beneath my feet, hurling me to the ground. I roll prone and shield my head as lashing concussions detonate. I’m flung across the ground with tremendous force—one, two, three more times. Large fissures rip apart the basin. The stream boils, and dark frothy muddy sediment spills the banks. This must be an earthquake, I think to myself. This is what I always imagined an earthquake would feel like, like the earth rearing-up and swallowing you whole.

Silence settles and the earth stills. I pull to my feet on quivering legs, my clothes soaked in muddy runoff, and I take a look around. The industrial complex lays half-buried, swallowed in white milky mist. Boulders roll down the mountainside, crash against the steep inclines, and disintegrate into dust. Along the sheer mountain wall, an immense plate silently avalanches into a huge tossing wave, plunging toward the basin. The sound reaches us after a moment—roaring booming rumbling thunder. The earth trembles beneath my feet. A large white cloud slowly rises and spreads over the industrial complex. It billows upwards and crawls across the valley toward us.

Lith shoves me toward her horse, and addresses Kitson and Graf. “Mount-up and ride like hell!” She slips a boot into the horse’s stirrup and leaps into the saddle. “Mount-up!” she yells at me and gives me her hand. I use the toe of her boot as a step, climb over the horse, and mount in front of her. “Keep to the timber till we hit the ravine!” she yells at the men. She slaps her horse heavily on its flank with her open palm and tosses the reins. He snorts, leaps, and gallops across the basin, his hooves splashing the muddy water spilled from the banks.

The sky darkens and a large debris cloud descends. Lith rips her scarf from her chest and covers my head with it just as pulverized rock, dust, and icy gravel rains down. We canter through the scarred hillsides to a thick pine thatch, slacken the horses to a brisk trot, and follow a beaten-down trail. We exit the woods onto a long straight railroad track cutting through a dense grove of tall alders. “Rein-in,” Lith says and halts the horse over the rusted railroad tracks. We batter dust and sediment from our clothes and our hair, coughing riotously. I wipe the grit from my mouth with my sleeve. “Change of plans,” she says. “Shadow’s End.”


	2. Chapter Two

Chapter Two

“Halt!” a voice yells in stern command as we approach a fortified guardhouse, which flanks a deck-plate bridge over a narrow river gorge. Kitted-up Fireflies swing their assault rifles to combat-ready and fan toward us. A middle-aged olive-skinned man in body armor breaks from the knot of soldiers, clearly the most senior in rank. The guard commander, I suppose. “Who’s there?” he yells and knifes a hand over his eyes. “Friends,” Lith replies. His eyes flicker recognition and his manner turns genial. “Advance, friends!” he yells. We dismount and meet him halfway. He shakes Lith’s hand and pulls her into an embrace. She’s a big woman, and she’s even bigger and broader than him. “Ride far?” he asks.

“Very far,” she says.

“Changed horses?”

“Not yet.”

“Where’d she come from?” he asks, meaning me.

“East.”

“Headed west?” he asks and she nods her head, yes. “Word is one of ’em big volcanoes erupted out yonder,” he says and gestures westward. “Triggered the whole damn chain. Washington, Oregon, California Territories—buried in ashes. Quake oil seepage’ll be golden up in ’em hills.”

A deep explosive thunder reverberates the mountain ranges and someone yells, “Here comes another one!” Lith grabs her horse’s reins and steadies him by the saddle. The soldiers clutch their assault rifles and square over the trembling earth. After the last aftershock dissipates, a band of guards escorts us over the bridge flanked by armor-plated vehicles and five-ton trucks. We follow the railroad tracks through a rolling field until they split and multiply and we come to a large railway switchyard with pump stations, brick substations, and gondolas. Prowler duty Fireflies in combat uniforms scout the perimeters with upmarket assault rifles held at low alert. We cross beneath a large watchtower, past multi-level railcars converted into battalion barracks.

The railyard ends at a massive triple-stall brick engine house with double-volume cathedral windows and a peaked roof. Firefly banners flutter from flagpoles. Sweet wood fire smoke perfumes the air, a wonderful welcoming smell after such a long hard journey. My stomach rumbles, reminding me of my hunger. We hand the horses’ reins to escorts who lead them toward a large freight shed converted into a stable, surrounded by corrals.

We enter the engine house through floor-to-ceiling arched doorways large enough to accommodate multiple trains. The vast open space must be where they do indoor PT, and hold ceremonies and addresses. The floor plan has been partitioned into a mess hall, a cook-house, a meeting hall, a command center, an armory, and conference rooms. I follow Lith and the men into a large freight shed converted into toilets. Lith steers me toward a long pine countertop set with aluminum water buckets and aromatic bunches of rosemary, thyme, and verbena. “Go on, rinse the sand outta your craw,” she says and hands me a damp washcloth. I take it and scrub a fine gritty coat of sand from my hands, face, and neck, erasing the stains of travel. She knocks dust from her clothes with a stiff-bristled brush. Graf and Kitson dunk their heads into a long water trough, and scrub their teeth with washcloths. They study their reflections in broken mirrors mounted to the wall, and groom their hair and short beards with plastic combs tied to the faucets by leather thongs.

In the mess, garrulous soldiers huddle long planked-top dining tables cast in the light of large iron oil lanterns hanging from massive black ceiling beams. The air’s redolent of tobacco smoke, spilled alcohol, and freshly-seared meat from the cookhouse. Packed shoulder-to-shoulder on the benches, the soldiers talk loudly and laugh freely, passing dinnerware heaped with generous rations. We sit at a back table and help ourselves to spiced moose meat, blueberry jelly, potato beer, and large loaves of charred wheat bread till we’re stuffed. In the vast eaves above, swallows twitter and sail from large nests. Bats shuffle the iron beams in ghostly circles. I’d never join the Fireflies but this doesn’t seem bad at all. Being a Firefly doesn’t seem like very hard work. Everyone’s well-groomed and in high spirits. Their load-out’s pristine and upmarket. There’s a lot of laughter among the soldiers but it’s a businesslike and efficient atmosphere. There’s leadership but it’s casual.

The guard commander from the bridge checkpoint comes over and sits next to Lith. He pulls a map from his chest kit and anchors it to the table with his semi-automatic pistols. He pulls-out a plug of tobacco, a pipe, and a jackknife from his chest pouch. He cuts a chunk of tobacco from the plug, rolls it between his palms, licks the knife’s blade, and loads the bowl. After studying the map for a while, he and Lith excuse themselves and she addresses Graf and Kitson for tasking, “You’re on full alert and you’ll remain in that status until further orders.”

“When’s step-off?” Graf asks.

“Tomorrow at dawn,” she says. “Maintain your present positions on full alert until further orders are received. Clear?” They bark affirmation and she walks off with the guard commander. Graf drains his beer and upends the empty glass over his plate. “This is the life,” he says and looks around the hall. “At the Rock, you always know the day of the week by what’s on your plate. Monday beef stew and cabbage, Tuesday beans and franks, Wednesday deer kabobs. Here a man helps himself to whatever he wants and how much he wants.”

They decide it’s time for a smoke so we head outside where a low full moon casts the landscapes silver. The spicier smells of early fall mix with the dusky wood smoke of the campfires. We head toward the tracks overlooking a large brick station house, its windows illuminated soft yellow from oil lanterns. We take a flight of stairs to a concrete platform running along the tracks and they’re packed with off-duty Fireflies sitting around steel-grate fire pits and makeshift braziers. Some smoke pipes and corn-husk cigarettes, and some sip from steaming enamelware mugs, their relaxed faces painted warm in firelight. Relieved soldiers come and go at leisure.

We walk to the end of the platform till we find a free spot. Kitson and Graf unsling their M25s, and squat around the fire pit. Kitson kindles a small chip fire full of sweet pungent smoke. They dig polished pipes and calfskin pouches from their chest rigs, pack the bowls with tobacco, and light them with lit twigs. Pipe shanks resting their chests, they heave satisfied sighs, blue smoke coiling their bowls. Above the chatter of the other men, a lone horse whinnies from the stables, carried on the wind. A string of migrating geese pass overhead, their honks muffled in distance. It’s nice to be away from the horses for a bit, I think to myself. Nice to get the smell of them out of my nose. Nice to have the dust and grit out of my eyes and mouth.

Two soldiers approach us, their hips rung in tactical holsters and M40 gas mask kits. They wear dark combat pants with knee pads and soft-shell nylon jackets. “‘Sup bitches?” the larger stockier man says down his barrel chest. He’s got red hair buzzed high and tight. “Airing-out your bitch tits?” He sits heavily between Graf and Kitson. He unslings his M25 and holds it between his thick thighs, the muscles straining through the fabric of his pants. The other man’s slimmer and shorter with penetrating eyes and fair clean-cut looks. He sits next to me, unholsters his M4, and lays it across his lap.

Graf makes introductions. The clean-cut blond man at my side is called Bronc and the red-haired man across the fire is called Hightower. When he says Hightower’s name, my lips part soundlessly because it’s clearly the same man Tommy told me about, the one who recruited him. With his coarse vulgar manner and his flaming red hair, there’s no doubt about it. “Fuck your fucking pleasantries,” Hightower says to Graf. “I don’t want none of your damned pleasantries.” He looks at me with small dark eyes. “I know who she is and I reckon she knows enough about me. I just wanted to see what she was all about.”

“Well?” Graf asks. Hightower sniffs contemptuously and says, “Nothing much,” and the men laugh. I suppose I should feel some sort of vague kinship with the man Tommy considered a second brother but I don’t. He radiates menace and violence. It makes me realize how much Tommy must’ve changed after he defected from the Fireflies. I can’t imagine him and Hightower doing much of anything together. He and Bronc dig pipes and pouches from their chest kits. They pack the bowls, slip the bits to their mouths, and light them with kindled twigs. Bronc addresses me, waving his pipe abstractedly around, “What do you think of Shadow’s End?” 

“Me?” I ask. “I’m just a girl. I don’t think about much at all.”

“You don’t, huh? If you’re just a girl, I’m Santa Claus.”

I laugh picturing this and say, “I’m just trying to mind my own business.”

“Smart girl,” he says and smiles warmly.

“Trains are kinda cool,” I add.

“The station of lost footsteps,” Graf says. “Waiting for a train that’ll never come.”

“I’ve never been on one,” I say.

“Can’t board a train that never comes.”

“I’d be happy to never set foot on one again,” Hightower says. “I was always waiting for one, late for one, running for one, or just missed one.”

“There are two types of train folks,” Bronc says. “Train catchers and train slackers.” Hightower laughs and says, “I’ve caught colds, fish, STDs, and I’ve been caught cheating, but I never could catch no goddamn train. I could’ve pitched a tent on the platform and I still would’ve missed it!”

“A train keeps its word,” Bronc says. “When it’s coming, it’s coming. I loved ’em when I was a kid. Racing down the next bend, over the next bridge, chasing the sun, blasting through the crossroads, stopping to pick up strangers, putting down the old ones, and forging ahead to the end of the line. A railway always leads you somewhere.”

“How fast did they go?” I ask.

“Pretty fast,” Bronc says.

“Faster than a car?” I ask. Bronc smiles mischievously and says, “Back before the Critical, trains were a luxury, only for the rich. They ran on rocket fuel. At first, there weren’t even bridges—they just floated right over the valleys and rivers. Folks would put-up springboards at the mountain passes. They added bridges later…just to be safe.”

“Seriously?” I ask. It sounds like a lie but what do I know? Everything about the Old World sounds insane. Graf’s eyes sparkle and he says, “Sure enough. They had wings, like airplanes. No stations, either. Folks just parachuted out when they got close to their stops.”

Hightower laughs and says, “The ones carrying freight shot their loads straight outta cannons mounted on the caboose!”

“None of that’s true, is it?” I ask. They look at each other with amused smiles. They’re just messing with me. Graf tosses a log onto the fire and rakes the embers with a tri-fold shovel. He settles against the wall and packs another bowl. “What are you smoking, Chief?” Hightower asks him.

“Mixings,” Graf says and waves it at him. “Have some.”

“I smoke my own,” Hightower says, rebuffing him. “I know what it is.”

“I mix it with white oak,” Graf says. “Lasts longer and satisfies the worst cravings. The worst thing I ever smoked was tarred rope rolled in a piss-soaked twenty-dollar bill. That’s the Native American in me. I’ll smoke pretty near anything.”

“You’re Native American?” I ask.

“Half, and half Mexican. A red-blooded mix.”

“From Mexico?” I ask.

“Second generation. Born and bred in the hills of Sonora.”

“How’d you end-up here?”

“I was in San Francisco doing construction, there ‘cause of my brother. He was the brains of the family, founded a website worth billions. He bought acres and acres of land on one of ‘em wooded islands off the San Juan Islands. Had a dozen generators, solar panels, and he stocked it with guns, ammo, and weed. All ‘em Silicon Valley folks knew it was coming. The Event. The collapse of nature. Climate change, global warming, social unrest, nuclear war, a raging virus, the robot uprising, hacking the infrastructure. Who knew it’d be some goddamn fungus? Survival was about one thing—escape—so we left in the middle of the night, on his cruiser from a slip out back. We drifted along for a couple weeks, north-northwest, and skirted the coast till we hit a roaring living gale. We were twenty miles offshore of Anacortes just south of Vancouver Island, plying between the mainland and the little offshore islands, when after sunrise, a thick fog and a deathly cold rolled in. The sky turned yellow-green. We lashed everything down and got ready for some dirty weather.

“All morning the rain drenched us to the bone. The wind increased every minute, squalls blowing down from the headlands, the sea boiling and the tides surging. A fifty foot wave came tumbling past the mast, bore down, and swamped over us. We capsized and hit the water. We clung to the mast, took off our jackets and shoes, and started swimming toward the shore but there was a heavy current, a strong wind, and a bad gale blowing straight at us. The sleet cut down like razors. It’s a miracle we didn’t drown outright. My brother started struggling. He told me to get to the shore, get some help, and come back for him, so I towed him back and set back out. The cold penetrated to the bone, took away all my strength. My arms and legs started to lock-up so I turned around and let the wind and current drift me back. My brother wasn’t looking so good. His face was white as a ghost. His arm slipped away and he went under. I dove for him and brought him back up by his hair. It took tremendous strength. A massive swell came and swept him away. He was gone. I woke-up on the bottom of a boat wrapped in a blanket.”

Kitson continues the story from his perspective, “We saw this big black thing bobbing up and down in the water. We didn’t know if it was a porpoise or a dolphin or what. We tried talking him into the boat but he kept diving, muttering about his brother. We had to forcibly remove him from the water. He was buck naked and wouldn’t let go of my neck! Death’s grip.”

“Grip of despair,” Graf laughs. “Better he didn’t make it. His biggest fear was going broke. Money was his yardstick of success. He knew nothing else.”

“He was dead before he went under,” Kitson says.

“I remember him without love or hate,” Graf says.

“I lit-out with my brother,” Kitson says. “Waterways, too. We loaded-up the canoe, drove out to the nearest river, and never looked back. By day we paddled. By night, we went ashore and slept under the canoe or drifted downstream, watching the moon and stars swing around. Somewhere around Idaho Territory, I put him on brew-up and went to take a leak. When I got back, he was dead.”

“He got bit?” Bronc asks.

“I gave him a bowie for his 16th birthday,” Kitson continues. “He kept it sheathed to his belt till it rotted away. I told him a million fucking times to hang it at his hip but he kept it in front of his thigh in a holster he made outta an old pair of jeans. He sat down and must’ve punctured his femoral. He was still warm when I found him.” He shakes his head, no. “I couldn’t go back so I went on. I made it to Wyoming Territory through a chain of lakes till I hit a long stretch of rapids. I raced along at breakneck speed till I poured out into the quiet water where the river widened-out. Just as I started cutting toward the shore I got clipped by a strong current and couldn’t paddle my way out. It swept me around a bend and the view opened up like the river had been cut by a blade. The water gathered itself up and plunged me toward the falls.”

“You didn’t hear it?” Bronc asks.

“Sure did! Sounded like a death sentence!”

“Big drop?” Bronc asks.

“Fifty feet. The bow shot-up and sucked me into the narrowest fastest part of the falls. They found me on the rocks, bruised and battered with half my bones broken. I woke-up and it was dark. I saw a line of torches out yonder. I figured I was dead and the Devil’s henchmen were coming to get me! I passed out and woke up from someone shouting in my face. That’s when I knew I wasn’t dead—the dead don’t speak!”

“Bro, that’s crazy as fuck!” Hightower yells. “But I met him and he speaks!”

“Who does?” Kitson asks.

“The Grim Reaper,” Hightower says and the men laugh derisively. “Not a powerful lot but he does,” Hightower continues. “The first Thanksgiving after the Surrender. The day started-out rainy and foggy. The fields past the house were grey and smoking. At sunset, the sky started to clear and the sun peeked through. That’s when we saw something coming down the road, limping through the mist. It was the tallest thinnest oldest-looking man I ever saw carrying something long behind his shoulder—a scythe with the curved blade sticking-out sideways behind his head. He must’ve seen our chimney smoking ‘cause he stopped and knocked on the door.

“My brother didn’t wanna let him in, said he’d bring us bad luck. I told him to take the dick offa his chin—he was just an old man. ‘That ain’t no old man!’ he goes. ‘That’s the Grim Reaper!’ ‘He can barely walk,’ I said. It was Thanksgiving, for fuck’s sake. I told him we’d feed him and send him on his way. ‘Hell no!’ he goes. ‘The second he leaves, one of us dies, maybe both!’ I had to see for myself so I opened the door. He had a long white beard and his clothes were old rags. I asked him what he wanted and he said he couldn’t take another step. I looked down at his feet and they were swollen twice their size. He must’ve been walking for days. I brought him in and we fed him. His accent was strange. I couldn’t place it. He said he was a blade sharpener and asked us if we needed any sharpening so we took out our arsenal and laid it across the table. He went outside, came back with a stone, and you could’ve chopped a redwood in half with our blades when he was done.

“He got up to leave and my brother grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, threw him out the door and goes, ‘Off with you, Grim Reaper, and don’t you do no reaping here!’” He laughs dryly and continues, “I suppose he was onto something. He died a week later, shot-off his finger cleaning his gun. It got infected. His whole hand swelled-up like a balloon to the elbow. It wasn’t pretty. But I’m still here—”


	3. Chapter Three

Chapter Three

Pack! A shot pops-off from the direction of the station house. A machine gun coughs in response, weakly strobing the trees. I look at the men for tasking but their faces are unhurried. They’re not alarmed. “Shouldn’t we take cover?” I ask.

“Nah,” Graf says. “Someone’s just shooting a squirrel.”

“Drifters bent on suicide,” Bronc says. “Their last stand. We kindly try to oblige ’em.” Pack! Another bullet whips across the distance. “Unfuck yourselves!” Hightower yells in the direction of the shots and pulls to his feet. “Sit your ugly ass down!” Bronc yells at him and he yells back, “You’re trying to tell me some shit? I ain’t a scared little bitch!” He unsheathes a steel machete and whisks it maliciously through the air, the blade flashing ominously in the firelight.

“Got anything bigger?” Kitson laughs. Hightower kisses the flat edge of the blade and says, “Kills my enemies, hunts my food, spanks my kids, and beats my woman. Cuts a man from head to toe in a single blow.” He swings from the platform, cuts across the tracks, and heads toward the station house. For what, nobody knows. Bronc shakes his head, no, and says, “That there’s a goddamn fool.”

“Can’t get mad at fools for doing foolish things,” Graf says. “‘Cause of motherfuckers like that,” Bronc says, “I holed-up. Laid low and waited for things to quiet down. The streets weren’t safe. Criminals were turned loose—the mentally ill and the sick—rioting, looting, killing, and raping. The military turned bad real quick. Killing innocent folks, and breaking into houses and accusing folks of supporting fifth columns. They wiped-out entire towns and cities—men and boys—and left the women mutilated when they didn’t feel like finishing the job. If you got lucky, you found someone to vouch for you at a port but they were full of raging sickness.” He stares into the middle distance. “I wasn’t doing nothing important with my life no how. I took a lot for granted. I had everything I wanted, didn’t have a single care someone wasn’t eager to fulfill. I was doomed to a useless existence. My days and nights gave me no direction. The Fireflies gave me meaning, became my family and my purpose. We’re fighting for a country we didn’t even know we belonged to. I never wanted it till it was gone, never wanted it till someone took it away. We're taking it back, bit by bit.” He looks at me directly and says, “I wouldn’t be telling no strangers, but I’mma tell you this. I believe in a cure, think it’ll do a whole lotta good. Same as these sonsofbitches.” He means Kitson and Graf, and he addresses them directly, “Y’all talk mighty big but that’s the only reason we’re here.”

“Nah,” Kitson says. “We’ve got power, revolution, and rebellion. War.”

“Nobody wants war but the military,” Bronc says. “We ain’t waging war with no one.”

“Everyone in power wants war,” Kitson says. “War’s progress. The world’s dead between them.”

“Not all progress is good progress.”

“Progress is emancipation,” Kitson says. “Promise a revolution and people’ll work hard and swear their loyalty.”

“Promise a revolution,” Bronc says, “and they’ll kill before they even know who they’re supposed to be killing. War won’t bring nothing back. A cure’s the only way forward, the only way to defeat the military without firing a single shot. They’ve got a couple hundred years on us but we’ve got an ace in the hole.” He looks at me with a smile and says, “Mighty nice night to be meeting our light.”

“Me?” I ask.

“Who else is gonna lead us through the darkness?” he asks. So he believes in a cure but Graf and Kitson don’t? What kind of militia can’t even agree on something as simple as its cause? “Like it or not, life’s a competition,” he continues. “Ain’t enough of anything to go around. Whatever you’re after, you can bet someone else’s got their eye on it. This ain’t healthy competition aimed at bringing-out no one’s best. It’s fierce survival, and we’re ready to fight and win.” He looks at me directly and asks, “Lemme ask you something. You’re an orphan, yeah?”

“Yeah,” I say.

“Only child?”

“Yeah.”

“Weren’t raised with no siblings?”

“No.”

“Then I reckon it’s hard for you to understand. You didn’t have to compete for a fair shot. I was one of eight. I had to hold my own against my brothers and sisters, had to fight for everything, had to yell right back in their faces if I wanted my fair share of a meal or to play with the newest toy. I was pushed to compete aggressively at a young age and now I do it out of vindictiveness with everyone for everything. Life feels incomplete without struggle and conflict. Sometimes you lose big and let things get away from you rather than face the consequences. Loss of pride makes you vulnerable but those things are only as debilitating as you let ’em be. Now the stakes are higher. Even if we wanted to, we can’t run for the hills when the path looks tough. We’ve gotta fight and win ‘cause the prize is the cure. New society, new wealth, new power, new influence. It ain’t gonna be gained by blood or by trade. It’s gotta be earned by achievement and merit. Someone’ll create a new industry from scratch and conquer a big bad evil. That’s the new world leader. It’s either the United States Armed Forces or us, and I know whose side I’m on—” His head swivels toward the station house and his eyes narrow into slits.

I follow his gaze to a large form rising from the darkness. It’s Hightower, returning from wherever he went. He swings onto the platform in front of us and I recoil at the sight of him, slicked in thick blood from head to toe. He holds a dripping red mass of freshly slaughtered meat in his fist. His arm’s stained vibrant red to his shoulder. It looks like he’s been butchering livestock. He tosses the bloody mass into the air and smacks it with the flat side of the machete. Plop! It lands in my lap, warm and heavy, gore splattering everywhere. I shriek and sweep it fiercely from my lap, and it lands on the ground with a dull bloody splatter. I gasp at the sight—the meaty severed cock and balls of an anonymous man. Hightower grabs me by the collar and hauls me into his chest till we’re nose-to-nose. “See that?” he yells, his nose snarled and his lower lip drawn over his clenched teeth. He jabs his machete toward the bloody gored genitals. “That’s what I’mma do to your faggot father if I ever cross him!” His eyes burn with a hard bright glint. A muscle at the base of this throat twitches. “I’mma castrate him with a rusty knife. And that’s just the beginning! You got that?”

“Lemme go!” I yell and fight against him. He shakes me hard till my hair falls all over my face and says, “Do I need to tattoo it onto my dick and fuck it into you?”

“Calm your bitch ass down, Hightower!” Bronc yells and grabs his arm, trying to pull him away. Hightower shoves him backward into the other men and yells, “All you little bitches are my sons! I’ll beat any man in this country! Come at me! I’ll beat you down! Any man in this country wants it, let him come!” He seethes rage. The only sound is his labored breath and the popping embers of the fire. He turns his attention back to me, his eyes wild and black, and says, “Tommy Miller. Where’s he at? Wyoming Territory? Montana? Colorado? Utah? Gimme an address. I’mma pay him a visit. And his bitch-boy brother, too!” I don’t respond. He’s three times my size. His whole face is bloated in rage and he’s looking for any excuse to use it on me or anyone who interferes. He finger-rakes his hair and shoves it back from his forehead. “That’s alright,” he says, feigning composure, his mouth set in a cold contemptuous grin. “I’ve run into a hundred little bitches like him. That’s how his momma taught him—how to be a little bitch. Fucking my woman, scared and quitting ‘cause I knocked him out like a little bitch. I always figured he was the kinda homo who’d go around shooting folks in the back. I’ve got no love for the goddamn Miller breed and I ain’t changing my mind. If I ever see ‘em dick-riding cocksuckers in this here country, I’mma shoot ’em dead—”

“Tommy’s dead!” I yell. “He’s gone!” His face turns grey and every muscle in his body tenses. “What?” he asks. “What’d you say?”

“Tommy’s dead,” I say.

“No,” he says.

“Yes.”

“No.”

“He’s dead,” I say. He goes very still and quiet as he takes it all in. After a moment, he looks at me directly, his eyes glinting hard, and he says, “You’re telling me how he died, child.”

“Killed,” I say, my voice soft. “By his brother.”

He draws-in a sharp breath and yells, “Get to talking!”

“There’s nothing to say.” I’m surprised at how calm my voice sounds, like I’m just passing-on information he needs to know.

“I’m asking you what you know about it!”

“I already told you!”

“Your story don’t jibe!” he yells. From behind us comes an authoritative mezzo voice—Lith’s voice. “What’s the ruckus?” she asks and the men fall back. She looks at them with cold steady eyes and says, “Sentry duty in the Deep till further orders. All of you.” The men gather their load-out. I can tell by the look on their faces it’s shit duty.


	4. Chapter Four

Chapter Four

Her manner stern and efficient, Lith orders me to come along to the station house so I follow her. We get inside and she leads me down a long hallway on the first floor. She ushers me into a large rectangular room with a high ceiling, tall windows, and bunk beds lining the long walls. A cast-iron stove bellows flame and fills the room with radiant heat and fragrant smoke. This is our barracks for the night, is what I’m thinking.

She tells me to sit and gestures at a steel card table in the center of the room. She pulls firewood from a steel rack and tosses it into the brick-lined firebox. She fills a saucepan with water from a foot-pump sink and heats it up. When it boils, she hands it to me with a rag so I can clean off the gore from Hightower’s slaughter. While I bathe, she makes us something to drink. Moonshine whisky with boiled water, sweetened with honey. She sits across from me at the table, hands me a glass mug, and raises hers for a toast. “To whatever tomorrow brings,” she says.

“Never look back,” I say.

“Look for the light,” she says and we drink in silence. It’s a very nice drink, hot and sweet. “He enlisted on his 21st birthday,” she says.

“Who?” I ask.

“Hightower.”

“Was he always a lunatic?”

“He’s a good loyal obedient soldier. He always does his job. There’s nothing he loves more than being turned loose and ambushing a town full of military and infectids. He handles any weapon you put in his hands like he’s been born with it. Tommy told you about him?”

“That’s right,” I say. “He told me.”

“You weren’t lying?” she asks, meaning Tommy's death.

“Why would I lie about that?” I ask. 

“What happened?”

“Joel killed him.”

“For good reason?”

“Things got…heated.”

“May God have mercy on him.” She lifts her glass for a toast. “To the death of Tommy. I hope it was a good quick death.” We clink glasses and drink, and she continues, “I never thought there was a whole lotta good in those Miller boys but we needed men like that in this country. Hightower tried to recruit both. Tommy was a great benefit to us. He rid us of a whole lotta bad. We lost a good soldier and Hightower lost a brother the day he went AWOL. There aren’t many left like him in the world. He laughed in the face of death. He couldn’t be intimidated—even Hightower knew not to antagonize him. He was jealous of him, the only man in the world he ever envied, the only man who made him feel like he couldn’t win against him in a fight, and that always bothered him. Tommy wasn’t the handsomest but he was the most sought-after. The way he carried himself, his pride, and his build.”

“Joel would never join,” I say. “I wouldn’t, either.”

“Why’s that?” she asks and I think about this. There are plenty of reasons. I’m not a revolutionary. I’m not even a fighter. I don’t have the tenacity. I’m too small. I get easily distracted. I move onto other things too quickly. I’m not interested in gaining power. It’s too rigid for me. I don’t care for authority myself. I hate converts and people who aren’t their true authentic selves. What’s the point? I realized by being around Tommy and Joel, you can’t change people like them. You can’t change people at all. You can only change the world you live in. There’s something else, too, and I tell her, “There’s not a single person in this world who could convince me to kill someone in order to further their own cause.”

“You’ve killed for him,” she says, meaning Joel.

“I killed to avoid being killed myself,” I say.

“You lied for him. You took risks for him. You broke your ass for him. If there’s something you haven’t done for him go ahead and tell me.”

“I always did what was asked of me.”

“That’s a lotta wrong thinking.”

“At least it’s my own thinking,” I say and she smirks. “Don’t listen to me if you don’t like it,” I continue. “I’m just trying to figure things out.”

“Figure what out?”

“I think the cure is just a petty competition between you and the military. Am I right?”

“It’ll all be answered in due course.”

“I'm entitled to an answer.”

“When you think you’ve figured it out, let me know,” she says.

“I think you’ve given-up on the idea of a cure but you’re too stubborn to admit it.”

“You don’t believe in our cause?”

“I don’t even know what it is.”

“Lemme ask you this,” she asks. “What kind of cause would you support?” I take a moment to think about this. I'd support a cause that brings about change. I want to change the world for the better. I like the idea of leaving things better than you found them, and not just for the people you care about but for all mankind. I can't stand oppression and inequality. I want a world where people can be kind, where kindness is possible. “I wanna help the helpless,” I say. “I wanna fix things. I wanna fight for justice in this world. I wanna end suffering. Everyone’s entitled to fresh air, pure water, and clean food. People should be able to live, work, and die better than animals. I wanna do it with heart and humanity. With openness and honesty. Not by throwing bombs and killing people, like you. The world’s gone to Hell and you’ve done nothing but fuel an endless cycle of violence. I wanna stop it before it starts.”

“So you wanna be kind?” she asks. “Reform the masses with kindness? Well, you can’t rule people with charity. You rule them with fear and intimidation. Jesus tried to lead peacefully and look how he ended-up. They’ll do the same to you.”

“Your business is to take life,” I say. “I wanna preserve it.”

“Just because justice’s been violated doesn’t mean it’s ceased to exist. We’ve brought about an insurgency and it’s in proportion to the sacrifice. We kill for the greater good. To remove the cancers infecting society so the rest of the world can live in peace.”

“That’s no different than the military,” I say. She scoffs and says, “The military thrives on discipline, obedience, and order. Compliance and useless obsolete outdated rules. You either make tyranny or you uphold it. They wanna annihilate and exterminate the remaining dregs of civilization, and build nothing over the destruction. Cordyceps outbreak in a QZ? Burn it down, blow it up, level it to the ground, and bury it beneath the ashes! Listen, I don’t care if things are destroyed but you've gotta replace them with something better. You have every right to condemn what’s wrong with the world but you can’t complain and offer no solution. We’re fighting to make this cursed world a better place. To heal it and position it toward an open society. We’ve inserted our ideologies, identified what’s decaying it, and we’re actively rooting it out. We’ve started the movement and when people are attracted to the same ideas, they come together naturally. We’re realists, progressives, and nonconformists. We stand for anti-militarism, anti-authoritarianism, and pacifism. Violence, but only when it’s necessary to advance our mission.”

“So what's the mission?” I ask.

“My first tasking was pacification missions. The Fireflies sent me to ports where kids never knew what it was like not to be hungry. Most of them had never even tasted milk. Their lives had been put in danger and jeopardy by the cruelty of the military. We’d send doctors and give them food. Medicine if we had any. Milk. Our doctors treated the sick and the crippled. We helped pregnant women, sometimes helped them give birth. Prenatal care. Clean water, nutrition, and sanitation. Blankets, shoes, and clothes. We worked miracles.”

“Miracles,” I say mockingly. “You sound like the New Millenniums.”

“They don’t want a cure.”

“And you do?” I ask, digging.

“It doesn’t matter what I believe in.”

“Well you believe in something, don’t you?” I ask.

“Fulfilling obligations. Affairs of honor. It must go on till the end.”

“Then I guess I’ll try to make the best out of what destiny assigned me.”

She scoffs and asks, “Know what destiny assigned me?”

“How should I know?”

“My father used to tie me up and beat me. He raped me.” My stomach sinks. I fumble for the right words but nothing comes. She continues, “I won’t go into details. It got so bad, the neighbors had to intervene. He got sent to jail for the last one he pulled but he didn’t get a long sentence. Just a year. He should’ve gotten life. I grew-up in the year he was gone. I was sent to live with a nice family where I ate all the good food I wanted to eat, drank all the fresh milk I wanted to drink, and played in green fields with sunlight, fresh air, and flowers for as long as I wanted. I learned, lived, and played in peace. I shot-up overnight, big and tall, but I still carried the scars from the crime he went to prison for. He’d beaten my head clean open. Knocked all the nerve clear outta me and driven it deep down.

“He served his time and came back for me. It was just the two of us. We had a small ranch and a couple of horses. I lived for those horses. He wanted to put me back to work. Back-breaking labor. Milking, churning, sewing, cooking, and cleaning. I was your age but a lot bigger than you, almost as tall as him. He knew I could work hard. He didn’t say a word, just gestured for me to follow him. He rarely wasted conversation on me. I wouldn’t go. I had a deep sense of foreboding. ‘Get your things,’ he said. ‘You’re coming with me.’ I told him I wouldn’t go. ‘Don’t argue. Get your goddamn things.’ I was terrified. I couldn’t move. I cowered in a corner. He picked me up and carried me out. I couldn’t even cry. I was paralyzed with fear. We got back to the house, and he dragged me to the stables and shoved me into a stall. It was a good distance from everything. The sound didn’t carry to the neighbors. He walked up to me with a whip over his head. I knew what was coming. ‘You ain’t ever gonna lie me into prison again!’ he yelled. He shoved me down and started tearing off my clothes. I fought back.” She looks at me directly, her eyes black with recalled trauma. “I wish I could’ve killed him a hundred more times.”

What do I say to that? There are no words of compassion I could give her. She wouldn’t want them anyway. “If it makes you feel any better,” I say, not actually knowing why it should make her feel any better, “I don’t know where I was born or who I was born to. I don’t even know if my name or my birthday’s real."

She laughs and says, “That precious little head of yours once laid upon your mother’s breast.” I don’t respond. My mother means nothing to me. I don’t care who she was. I don’t belong to anyone in this world but Joel. “I knew her,” she continues. “Briefly. You have her same eyes, her hair, her height. Her same spirit. She was vibrant. Self-possessed. An individualist, fearless in her beliefs.”

My temples burn and my mouth bitters. “She gave me away,” I say. “She failed to take care of me. Someone else had to do it for her.”

She laughs, deep from her throat. “Youth—smug and indifferent, apathetic and angry.”

The back of my neck flushes hot with blood. “Everything you know about me is written on a bounty!” I yell.

“I know your generation. A dead generation. Bastards and orphans. Nobodies. Illegitimate children born of nothing, without a sense of identity. Hand-me-down kids passed from family to family. Mine was the last to have big dreams and aspirations. You’ll go your whole life, do nothing, see nothing, go nowhere, and have nothing to live up to. I’d be angry, too. You don’t know where you came from or where you’re going. Rootless, lazy, shiftless, and aimless. Born under the shadow of terror. The best years of your life are squandered, poured into a world of destruction.”

“Your generation caused it!” I yell. “Yours let it happen—polluted the world with poison, tipped the balance of nature—and did nothing to stop it! We’ve inherited your generation’s plague! Yours is cursed forever, despised by every generation that comes after it! Yours owes us a cure!”

“The world’s been sunk way too long in disorder for a cure,” she says. “The only ones left aren’t doing it a bit of good. No one’s capable of taking over or leading a new regime. Too many divided authorities and decentralized powers. No one knows who they’re supposed to be loyal to anymore. One says this and the other says that. The only ones left with experience and moderation are too old, too weak, too sick, and too strong-willed to work with the old governments and military, still clinging to faded power. Rogue factions are too violent and too preoccupied with settling past scores to set-up stable governments, and too corrupt to be trusted. The world’s on the brink of annihilation. No cure can save it. Mankind’s almost as extinct as the great species he hunted-down with his gun and his greed. We’re in the age of elimination. The world’s a graveyard. We’re just mourners, waiting for it to take its last breath so we can go ahead and bury it.” She finishes the last inch of her drink, gets up from the table, and sits on one of the lower bunk beds. “For tonight,” she says, “let’s let matters rest.”


	5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

Something weighs on Lith’s mind. I don’t know her well enough to know what it is but I can see the heavy thoughts gathering-up behind her eyes. I suppose it’s the memories of her abusive father. Who could blame her? “What is it?” I ask.

“Wanna join me tonight?” she asks. Join her, where, I wonder. Another drink by the fire? A game of cards? Does she want to read my palm and tell me my fortune? Braid each other’s hair? The possibilities are endless. “We’re a long way from the men and the horses,” she says. “We can do whatever you want.” I realize she’s speaking in coded language but I don’t understand what she’s getting at. What the hell’s she after? Something, but what? “What do you mean?” I ask. “I need a good fuck,” she responds and it takes me a moment to process this. I know her well enough to know she’s not trying to shock me. If she says she wants to fuck, she wants to fuck. “Me?” I ask.

“When’s the last time you were fucked?” she asks.

“I don’t remember. You?”

“It wasn’t any good. Let’s make tonight memorable.”

“You wanna fuck me?”

“If you’ll let me.”

“Are you a lesbian?” I ask.

“If you don’t want to, I understand. No hard feelings.”

I take a moment to think about this. To fuck a woman. In Boston, women fucking women was wicked fucking queer, they said. Queer girls doing queer things. There were a handful of girls who fucked girls but we called them bitches because it sounded better than ‘queer’ in the Bostonian accent. That’s not what nice girls did, they said. Filthy cunt-lickers. A perversion. A sin. Only nasty girls sucked another girl’s twat. Why they believed that, I have no idea. Puritans, I suppose. I realize what’s between my legs doesn’t care if it’s a man or a woman who's doing the fucking. Why should I care, either? I haven’t known Lith for a very long time but I admire her. I admire women like her. She’s tough but seeks solutions. Bold and dominant, clever and immodest. She’s got an elemental savage quality I’m attracted to. 

“Take off your clothes and come lay down with me,” she says. I think about this for a moment and go to the bedside where I pull down my jeans and sit on the edge of the bunk to work them off. I hear her weight shifting over the mattress. I picture her undressing so I glance at her over my shoulder to find I’m right. I strip down to my bra and panties, and glance at her. She lays on her back in her underwear and she's shifted herself to one side of the mattress to make room for me.

I climb onto the bed and lay flat on my back at her side. I stare up at the upper bunk above us, unsure of what to do with myself. I’ve never been with a woman and I haven’t been with a whole lot of men. I don’t know why I should feel any different with a man or a woman but I do. She runs her hands over her belly, touching herself up. She’s very shapely. She’s got a very small waist and a flat firm belly, and a nice big muscular ass. Her breasts are much bigger than mine. Big and heavy, but they sit well and high against her broad chest. We must look funny, lying together, I think to myself. Her being so big and me being a miniature version of her, lying at her side. I clear my throat nervously and say, “I’ve never been with a woman.”

“Why not?” she asks.

“They said it was queer,” I say. She throws back her head and laughs. A full-bodied uninhibited laugh. “We’re women,” she says. “We know all the right places.” She rolls toward me with her weight propped up on her elbow. She takes one of my breasts into one of her hands and gently squeezes it. My nipple grows hard and firm beneath the flat of her hand. I like seeing her hand on my breast, touching me how I want to be touched. She moves down to my belly and feels-up my navel, running her fingers into it. She touches my thighs, rubbing them. She slips her hand over my twat and pets it through my underwear. I spread my legs for her and she continues to stroke me.

My hand goes to her belly. Her skin’s soft and her muscles are firm. I feel-up her thighs, running my fingernails up and down her skin. She opens her legs for me and spreads them wide, draping one of them over one of mine. Her legs have a very firm muscular feel to them. We rub each other through our panties, rubbing all around our twats. Her bush sticks out around the seams of her underwear. She digs her fingers beneath my panties’ waistband and pets the soft bristle over my twat. Her fingers slide all over my mound but she doesn’t go inside. She won’t touch the split and it’s driving me crazy. I don’t have much bush to soak up my wetness and everything between my legs is already sopping wet.

I slip my hand beneath her panties’ waistband and pet her twat. Her bush is thick, soft, and silky. I’ve never seen so much hair on a woman’s bush. It’s as big as a man’s bush but it’s very soft and long. It spreads-out over her thighs like vegetation. Long, soft, and curly. I dig into it and she’s very wet. My fingers pick-up the wetness coming out of her and soon her whole bush is slippery beneath my fingers. She rolls down my underwear and I roll down hers. She takes off her bra and I take off mine. She climbs between my legs and holds me open by my thighs. She licks and bites my belly, slowly fucking herself against me, grinding her twat against mine. She crawls between my thighs and runs her tongue along them, licking the wetness from my skin till she’s cleaned me off. She rubs her face all over my wet stubbly bush and slips her tongue over it, licking and kissing, but never going into the split.

I reach down a hand and dig around her hair. She looks up at me, half of her face buried in my bush. She’s got a lovesick look in her eyes. She touches the tip of her tongue to one of my lips. I gasp and make little pleased sounds. She pushes my thighs further apart. “I could lick you all night,” she says. Her arm goes under my ass and she holds my thighs wide open. She kisses me square over my twat and starts licking the split. I ooh and aah, squirming beneath her. She puts-in her tongue and licks deep into my split. I squeal. She runs her tongue up into me and twists it around. My thighs are boiling hot. I can’t hold myself still.

She buries her head between my thighs like she’s trying to push herself into me, and she starts to suck me. She sucks so hard it feels like she’s trying to suck my body clean out of my twat. I feel like I’m going to come so I tell her. She squeezes-in a finger and stuffs it deep, and I howl. I feel her lips flatten against my twat and she sucks everywhere her finger isn’t. I start to come and I can’t tell where she’s fucking me with her finger or sucking me with her lips. It makes me feel like I’m never going to stop coming. When I finally stop, she keeps her finger inside me and moves it around gently. She lays her head on my belly and kisses it. Everything she does feels amazing.

She crawls up to me and we fall into each other’s arms. She comes in close to kiss me, pushing her nose along mine. I want to kiss her. I want to taste myself on her lips and smell myself on her breath. We open our mouths and run our tongues into each other, gasping. Her breath’s sweet with the smell of me. Her whole face’s sticky with my come. She wraps her arms around me and rolls onto her back, taking me with her. We lay together, rubbing our bellies and breasts and cunts together, slowly fucking against each other. This feels wonderful. This feels so right. Why aren’t all women lesbians, I think to myself. She throws her thighs open and closed, again and again, and we slowly fuck against each other, both of us making little pleased sounds. She’s slicked in wetness halfway down to her knees.

I climb between her legs and she scoots back against the headboard a bit so she can watch me. I lay my head on her belly and bite her soft flesh, pushing my nose over her skin as I lick and kiss her. I can already smell her twat, thick and sweet. It’s all over her, all over me, and all over the bed. I work down to her thighs, take her leg, and push it back till it almost touches her chest. She’s all bush and ass crack from this angle. Dark, wet, and musky. Her twat looks huge, opened up and spread out before me. It makes me feel very inadequate, like I don’t have much of anything to fill it with, nothing to rub away her ache. I lay my face against her bush, soft and wet, and run my nose through it. I lay my head on her thigh and rub her belly with my other hand. Her skin’s burning up and slicked in sweat. I lick her thighs and she starts whimpering. I nip at them and she makes little gasps. I start licking around the edges of her twat and she begs me to lick her cunt. I slip my tongue over the lips and she opens her thighs wider. I lick along the edges of the lips, curling my tongue through her thick bush. “There!” she yells. “Put it there!” I run my tongue down her lips and suck them into my mouth. I can tell by the way she’s squirming all over the bed she’s dying to be fucked. “Please!” she yells. “Please put-in your tongue. Put it in! Put it in!” I hold her wide open with one hand. She’s very pink and fleshy. I stuff-in my tongue and she bellows. I pull it out, dripping wet. I twist it back in and out of her, my whole face pushing against her slippery bush, sopping wet. I hold her wide open as I lick and suck her, and she can’t hold herself still. I pull out my tongue and she wails, “Don’t stop! Don’t stop! It feels so good!”

She hooks her fingers into her twat and pulls the lips far apart, as far as they can go. She needs to be fucked, she yells. She begs me to fuck-in a finger, keeping herself spread wide open. I slip a finger against her split and run it up into her, right between her stretched lips, and I start to slowly fuck her. Her thick bush tickles my finger. She’s so hot and wet, it feels like I’m fucking my finger into a vat of hot oil. I push in another finger and continue to fuck her. She begs me for more so I slip in a third finger and stuff them as deep as I can. I bend over her twat, and lick and suck everywhere my hand isn’t. She’s so hot and loosened-up, it feels like I could stuff-in my whole hand without even stretching her, so I slip in another finger and she wails.

She reaches beneath her ass, grabs my wrist, and starts fucking herself with my hand. She fucks herself so furiously, I worry she’s going to break my fingers or fuck herself to death. She’s so loud, I’m surprised the guards haven’t knocked down the door. She fucks herself against me and stuffs my hand up into her twat as far as it’ll go, up past my wrist, grinding against me. She locks her ankles around my waist so I can’t get away. She’s coming, she wails. She wails and she wails. I bend over her, and suck and lick her breasts as she comes. It feels like she’s never going to stop coming. When she finally does, she lets go of my hand and her whole body goes limp, her legs splayed wide open, boiling hot. She reaches under her ass and eases out my hand very, very slowly.

I climb back up to her. She wraps me up in her arms and sighs, “That was wonderful.” She drifts-off to sleep holding onto me tight with her legs spread wide apart. The room’s heavy with the smell of our twats, the sweet smell that poured out of us as we fucked each other out. My nose smells of it and the bed smells of it. My mouth feels like I’ve been sucking on a salt lick. She opens her eyes and looks at me. She’s love-struck. She lays against me and rubs her soaking wet bush all over my thigh. We kiss and her lips still taste like my twat. She doesn’t need to tell me she wants to be fucked again.


	6. Chapter Six

Chapter Six

After breakfast of grilled salmon and strong black tea, we depart Shadow’s End on horseback under the rising sun. The landscape is monotonous—flat dusty grasslands broken-up by cornfields and wheat fields. We keep going till we approach a small abandoned town of charred bungalows, rusted garages, and barns with walls bulged in weakness. The air feels unsettling but I’m happy to break-up the boredom of the cornfields, to have something new to look at. About halfway down the main street, Lith slackens her horse to a walk. Keep moving, I yell at her silently, mounted in front of me. Why are you stopping? There’s nothing good here! I can feel it in my bones.

She fans her steel spurs against her horse’s sides and draws him down to a halt. Graf and Kitson follow her command, and halt, too. They swing their assault rifles to low-ready and wedge their boots securely into their stirrups. They must feel something, too. Lith’s horse throws his head upwards. She leans into his neck, peers between his stiff alert ears, and says, “Looks like we’ve got some company.” I follow her gaze up the dusty road where about a mile distant, a large rider on a large dark horse trots leisurely toward us. It’s too late to make a run for it. Even I know this. We’ll wait for him to ride-up and see what he wants. “We’re minding our own business and picking no arguments with nobody,” she continues, and says to me directly, “Grab on tight, little one.” What a dumb time to be mounted behind her, I think to myself. I grab her belt and grip the saddle with my knees. Whether she’s alarmed or not, I wouldn’t know. Fact is, we always have to be ready to run. We never know when we’ll have to fan it.

We watch the rider approach in a cloud of dust. He draws-down his horse to a halt a couple of yards in front of us and sits loosely in the saddle, silently watching us. He’s tall with broad shoulders, a square jaw, a heavy auburn mustache, long wild hair, and dust-rimmed eyes. One of his eyelids droops oddly. He holds his rifle across his saddle. His manner’s rugged but courteous. You’d expect to see a man like this out here. But what’s he doing here, out in the middle of nowhere? Lith greets him warmly, “Hello, stranger!”

“What are y’all doing in this here country and what’s your business?” he asks.

“No business in particular. Just roaming the west territory.”

“Y’all drifting yonderly?”

“That’s right.”

“Where to?”

“How far’s Rushville?”

“You’re looking at it,” he says, and Lith laughs and says, “I don’t see a goddamn thing.”

“It’s what’s left,” he says.

“What else is around here?” she asks and scans the barren flat surroundings.

“Nothing in particular. Just country.”

“What’s out yonder?” She gestures toward the western horizon, which is where we’re headed.

“Well, some folks call it Sheridan County. Others call it the Great Plains. Others call it Nebrasky.”

“Lotsa folks passing through?”

“They come yonder,” he says, pointing in the direction from we arrived, “and go yonder.” He points behind his shoulder. “You wouldn’t even know there’s so many folks all wanting to get someplace they ain’t.”

“How do we get to Scottsbluff?” she asks. He twirls his streaming mustache and considers this. It’s a friendly gesture. It breaks the tension. I feel Lith’s large body slacken a bit in the saddle. “Head straight down this pass,” he says. “Keep to the south edge of the prairie till you come to a creek and cross it at the first shallow. Follow straight north through the woods till you come to a level and swing right. You’ll hit a slope and cross back over the creek. Follow it till you run right into it—about thirty miles.”

“I’m thanking you,” she says.

“Don’t bother none,” he laughs. “Y’all ain’t never gonna arrive.” My blood ices at his reply, but before we can react, the sound of wild cries and whinnying horses breaks from behind one of the barns. A moment later, half a dozen riders mounted on chestnut horses stream toward us. Their long wild hair whips their bronzed foreheads, and they wear bandanas over their mouths and noses. My heart pounds my throat dry. The intent’s clear. An ambush. They want our pristine load-out and our tall strong horses. Kitson and Graf will be outright killed. Lith and I will be raped before we’re killed. This is how it goes.

Lith snarls and hurls the reins, driving us back between Graf and Kitson who hold the trail. Pack! Pack! Pack! Cartridges whip past my ears. With a broad command, she kicks her spurs and whips the horse into a flat-out full-on gallop in the direction we came. His hooves toss the sand and the dirt. I scan the path ahead and realize we’re fucked. No doubt about it. There’s no timber or streets to lose the riders. If they get past Kitson and Graf we’re as good as dead. I draw-in my shoulders, expecting to feel the cold steel of a bullet slam into my back. Lith bows into the horse’s elongated neck and we rocket the trail in a dead-on run. “On, on! Faster, faster!” she yells into his ear. “On, on! Faster, faster!” Streaming rounds whistle the air maliciously, hissing past us. Clattering firepower bursts staccato. I pray it’s Graf and Kitson’s return fire. A rider surges aside us, kicking fiercely into his horse’s ribs. He’s got a clear easy shot but he doesn’t take it. My blood ices at this because it’s clear he wants to take us alive—warm bodies for raping. It’s why he hasn't outright killed us. They won’t shoot our horses, either, because they want them, too.

Lith pulls herself up full length in the saddle and draws the reins between her clenched teeth, steering hands-free. She tears a rawhide blacksnake from her hip, tosses back an arm, and whips it across the rider’s face. He screams and claws at his cheek. Blood streams from a deep gash down his neck. She tosses back the whip again and lashes the horse’s muzzle, towing it aside. She unsheathes her machete with her free hand and sweeps it across the rider’s neck. His decapitated head thumps to the ground and rolls catastrophically into the grass. She kicks into the horse’s thigh while simultaneously unhooking her whip. The horse falters, stumbles to its knees, and scrambles furiously upright, whinnying panic. It rockets into the adjacent field with the rider’s headless corpse wedged into the stirrups, his bloody shoulders thumping the ground as he’s dragged behind.

She gathers the reins from her mouth and guides the horse till he lengthens out. We gallop another couple miles till it’s clear nothing stirs behind us. Now what? What about Graf and Kitson? Maybe they’re dead. Maybe they’ve deserted us. Any way you look at it, we’ve got complications. She wheels the horse and we gallop back to the center of town. We pass dead riders over pools of dust-soaked blood covered in dirt and horse shit. Dead horses lay stiff on the ground with enormous craters in their shoulders and chests, their brains blown away through hollowed-out eye sockets.

We find Graf and Kitson sitting against the side of a barn in the shade, alive but wounded. Graf’s chest is covered in blood. He holds his body limply. His face is grey and pained. I can tell by the blood a bullet struck him in the shoulder. A couple inches lower and he wouldn’t be alive. His breath’s sharp and shrill. He’s lost a lot of blood but he’ll live if we can get him patched up quickly. His eyes are bright and present. I hope for his sake the bullet’s gone out the other side but by the state he’s in, I’m not sure. Kitson’s got a bullet in his calf. His bloody pant leg’s bloused to his knee. The flesh is ragged and swollen. He’ll be fine but he can’t stand nor walk on his wounded leg.

Lith and I sweep the town, and strip the riders and their horses. We find two riders wounded but still alive, moaning on the ground, covered in blood, dust, and horse shit. She unsheathes her machete and beheads them efficiently without a word. Lucky for them. They’re out of the game.

–––––––

I’m covered in Graf’s blood. His head rests over my lap. He’s pale and cold. He’s not hot or flushed and he’s not coughing-up blood. No red foam frothing his lips. He’s not dying but the bullet needs to be dug out before infection sets in. Fat sticky cold sweat beads his face. I wipe it away with my sleeve. I stroke his damp hair, pushing it back from his forehead. He watches me intently. I suppose he finds my presence comforting. He’s in great pain. Sharp wrenching pain. He holds-in his moans, trying to be brave. The long hard ride here must’ve been agonizing for him. Every jolt of the horse must’ve fired-up his wound again and again.

We’re holed-up in the corner carriage-unit of an abandoned condominium complex overlooking stinking muddy bogs. The rooms were stripped long ago. What remains is a couple useless lighting fixtures and waterlogged moldy wall-to-wall carpet in the bedrooms. We sit on the wooden flooring of the living room beneath a large glass chandelier. You can tell this was a nice place before the Critical. Lith paces the room, deep in thought. She fondles her long braid, running the length through her fingers. I’ve never seen her so distracted. She halts at my side and looks at me down her chest. I can feel her troubled thoughts coming off her. “What do you know about this kinda stuff?” she asks.

“More than most,” I say. She laughs dryly but it wasn’t a joke. I don’t know how the Fireflies follow the rules of engagement. It doesn’t matter. She knows nothing of how I passed my time at Jackson but after I treated Graf and Kitson’s superficial wounds, I suppose Gold’s influence was obvious. I don’t want to be in this position. I don’t want to make these decisions. These aren’t my men. I don’t even know their first names. This isn’t my fight. Kitson’s calf is grotesquely swollen. This can wait. Graf’s got a bullet lodged in his shoulder. This can’t wait. I suppose I owe it to both of them. Being cursed and always drawing innocent people into my troubles. “I’m game if he’s game,” I say to Lith, meaning Graf. “He’s gotta give me his word.”

Lith crouches at Graf’s side and takes one of his pale hands into hers. She pets it with genuine affection. “Danny,” she says, “Danny, you’ve fallen.” My heart knifes at this. Danny’s the name of a sweet good child, a name given by good faithful loving parents to a sweet kind bright child. He belonged to somebody. “You’re badly off,” Lith continues. “The bullet’s gotta come out. There’s a risk. We can put you on a horse but it’s too slow-going and we’re too far. You won’t make it to Salt Lake City and you won’t make it back to Shadow’s End. We’ll do whatever you say. Whatever you want. It’ll be tough.”

Graf looks at Lith and nods his head, yes. I mean, I _think_ he nodded his head, yes? The gesture was so minimal, I'm not sure. Lith addresses me and says, “Are you game?”

“If he says yes," I answer, "I’ll do my best.”

“Yes,” Graf whispers. I take his other hand in mine, and it’s cold and lifeless. “Graf, you’re not gonna die,” I say and his expression changes. The pain in his eyes shifts for a moment. He sighs. His breath’s weak but it’s a sigh of contentedness. He squeezes my hand weakly.

I swap places with Kitson to prepare for the procedure. While he comforts Graf, Lith and I scavenge the neighboring apartments and luck is on our side. We find some bed sheets, a couple bowls, and plastic tubs. We gather wood from the patchy timber around the complex and spark a fire in the fireplace. We haul water from the bogs and boil everything sterile. There’s a med pouch with basic supplies—ligature and needles, combat gauze, multi-tools, and antiseptic. We gather our rigging, and drape it over Graf’s body for warmth and the comfort of weight.

“Graf, I’m going in,” I warn him. “I’m telling you right now: don’t move—keep as still as you can. That bullet could be against an artery. If it hasn’t broken the wall, I can get it out safely. If I get it out safely, you’ll pull through. I’ll be as quick and gentle as possible. Try not to think about anything, okay?” He looks at me with fear in his eyes so I cradle his cheek with my hand. He closes his eyes and snuggles into my palm. My heart knifes but I push it back. What if the bullet’s plugging a main artery and he bleeds out? What if I nick a main artery and kill him? Stop with the hypotheticals, I tell myself. Just get on with it.

“Don’t move, okay?” I say. I lather-up my hands and the knife, and Lith rinses everything with the boiled water. I cut around the wound, lifting and stretching the skin. I part the incision and lay it open. Blood courses the fresh cut and Graf shivers uncontrollably. I know it must hurt like hell but it’s going to hurt a lot more by the time I’m through. I push the blade forward till I feel the bullet. Gently. Gently. I work as carefully and gently as I can, knowing every tiny movement is agonizing. I scrape along the bullet and feel its dimensions with the blade. I start to loosen the flesh from the sides and he passes out. Good, I suppose, as long as he doesn’t go into shock. I swap the knife with pliers and dig out the bullet. I want to breathe a big sigh of relief but there’s no time. I’m not done. The wound needs to be cleaned, stitched-up, and dressed. I look at Graf’s face and notice he’s awake. “You’re alright now,” I say. “The worst part’s over.” A deep shiver run through him but the sense of relief is fleeting. He’ll soon be in a lot of pain again.

Lith pats my back and says, “Well done, little one.” Her eyes carry deep respect. I like seeing this look on her face and hearing these words of praise. I meticulously wash out the wound, disinfect it, sew it up, and dress it. Kitson loads-up his pipe and holds it to Graf’s mouth so he can take a couple pulls. I take a small break and then I dig-out the bullet from Kitson’s swollen calf. I think about Gold as I do this and I feel his absence acutely. It burns something out of me. I wish he were here to see this. I wish I could tell him about this. He was the center of Jackson. Everyone went to him to ask for advice. To help settle disputes. He's dead and gone, and so is everyone else.

We start to bed down as the sky pitches grey. Graf moans for hours. Midday he finally passes-out into a deep, deep sleep.


	7. Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

I didn’t ask Lith where she got the car. I didn’t even notice when she had left. I only realized she was gone when I woke up to Graf’s moans and I couldn't find her anywhere in the condo. She showed up a couple hours later in a four-door sedan with a spindled grill welded to the front. Kitson drives the car. He’s a good driver. Lith is in the passenger seat and I’m in the back with Graf. He doesn’t look good, sweaty and flushed. I worry infection’s setting-in. I don’t know why I should care about this because I’m preoccupied with Joel. Every mile closer to Salt Lake City, my heart throbs with displacement and separation.

The mountainous landscapes are beautiful but the rural roads are treacherous, full of large boulders, rocks, and trees the storms and floods brought down. We’ve already stopped twice to chop-up fallen trees blocking the roads. Herds of deer weave in and out of the timber, their spooky eyes glowing in the descending twilight. If Graf weren’t wounded I suppose we’d stop for the night but we need to press on. Our luck’s run out. The mood is black. Everyone’s silent and anxious. It’s dangerous to drive at night because we can’t use the headlights—we’d be spotted too easily—so Kitson has to navigate by the weak light of the moon and the starshine.

We come to a spot in the road where the river runs away from it and the thick timber meets it on both sides. A bit further on, the road comes down to the far side of a valley and crosses a short trestle bridge spanning a brook before climbing back up again. The road leading to both sides of the bridge is framed by a long low stone wall. My stomach flutters at the sight of this. If Joel were driving on this road, he’d stop the car right now and turn around. I picture this in my head. He’d tell me a story about warrior Apaches sitting soundlessly on their ponies in breechcloths and moccasins. They’d be waiting for their watchmen at the top of the valley to give the command to ambush a stagecoach of settlers riding through the wild territory. I’d laugh at his story and tell him he was being paranoid but he’d point to the bridge with its stone walls, and say something like, ‘Ellie, I ain’t being edgy. That there’s a frame-up!’

That's what’s going to happen. I’m sure of this. I feel it deep in my gut like the Rushville ambush. Does Lith feel it, too? She must. Anyone would. I could say something but what’s the point? If it happens, it happens. I suppose it’s better to be killed by one quick blow than to die under drawn-out torture.

We approach the bridge. Nothing to do now but say a little prayer. We start passing the low stone wall and this is where there’d be an ambush, I think to myself. No doubt about it. I take a deep breath and hold it, drawing-in my shoulders in anticipation. We speed past the wall and clear it. I exhale relief and almost laugh out loud, giddy with relief. We race over the bridge and cross back onto the road. I’m flooded with another rush of relief, and it’s at this very moment, the rear window explodes in a burst of glass. Crash! A bullet rips past my ear, missing my head by an inch. Rifles flash and crack from the stone wall. The whole perimeter alights with enemy fire. The brakes screech and we careen across the road. Dust kicks up a massive cloud. “Don’t stop!” Lith yells at Kitson. “Don’t stop! Don’t stop! Don’t stop!” She aims her gun out the window and returns fire. Nonsense. We’re too far away at this point. You can’t be accurate in a moving vehicle. I want to tell her to save her ammo.

Pack! Pack! Pack! A bullet sings past my ear. I duck down in my seat. Pack! Pack! The car jerks wildly. They’ve shot-out our tires. Kitson fights for control. We speed wildly toward the drop-off and sail from the road toward the dark wooded canyon below. Airborne! My spine tingles, my stomach drops, and my chest hollows. Boom! The air concusses as we slam into the earth and plunge wildly down the valley. Boom! We crash into something solid rooted to the forest floor, which knocks me unconscious with a deafening blow.

I lid-up under the panicky grip of suffocation and draw a deep breath against the super-heated air. Am I alive? I’m alive! Swirling black smoke sweeps the cockpit in a choking hot blanket, fanned from the engine, engulfed in flames. Acrid soot burns my eyes and throat. Licking flames whisper ominously. Lith is slumped in her seat, unconscious, and pinned against a cushioned airbag. I can’t tell if she’s dead but I don’t care to find out. Kitson lays against the compressed steering column. Gore and brain matter splatter the cockpit around him. He’s dead. Graf’s dead, too. A headshot. He must’ve been hit before we flew off the road. None of this matters. They’re just dead people, no longer alive. Be glad it’s not you, I tell myself. They’re gone now and nothing can be done. You’re next if you don’t move. Move or you die. Move!

I frantically unfasten my safety belt and smash into the door hatch until it cracks open. I rush past the wreckage on wobbling knees and trembling legs. My legs shake so much I have to stop and steady myself against a tree for a moment. I look around and my blood ices at what I see. Dozens of burnt-out abandoned cars litter the forest floor in various states of decomposition. The rebels who ambushed us have already ambushed dozens before us. They’ll be down here shortly to sweep the destruction. This is a fact.

Now what? Now what the hell am I going to do? Without Joel at my side to carry my fear or tell me what to do, I’m terrified. Forests are full of wild beasts and rebels. I have no weapons and no provisions. No food and no compass. I only have the clothes on my back and the boots on my feet. I have nothing to help me survive. No matter. Joel taught me how to respect the woods and how to survive in them. He taught me it’s not the big beasts of the forests but the little ones to be most afraid of—insects, spiders, ants, flies, and mosquitoes. Little poisonous nuisances. They’ll lay their eggs in your wounds and kill you from the inside-out. Food’s not a pressing concern. You can eat almost anything to survive. You can even eat a snake but not the head where the poison is. If you’re lost, you search for a river. People make their dwellings along the river banks. That’s a fact. The rivers are like streets and all those streets come to a bigger street, which leads to a city, town, or settlement.

I think of what Joel would do if he were here with me. We’d keep to the woods where there’s lots of cover so we could lose the ambushers. Then we’d keep going until the trees ended and hole-up in a house or a shelter, or with whoever could keep us safe. With this in mind, I set-off into the deeper woodlands. It doesn’t matter which direction as long as there’s good cover. After a couple steps, I realize there’s something wrong with my ankle. Intense pain throbs my whole foot with every step but there’s no time to stop. Move or you die. I hobble through the timber for hours. I press forward till the pain stabs my leg unmercifully with each step and I can’t go any further without resting it. I scout for cover and find a large gnarled briar nest, the best I can find. I pull my anorak hood over my head and crawl beneath the briars, my hands slashed with stinging red welts. Utterly exhausted, I drift between shallow restless sleep and addled consciousness. I rouse often from piercing twinges of pain from my foot to my knee, and from the bitter coldness. I finally fall into a deep sleep in the middle of the night.

I wake shivering under milky-grey dawn skies. The forest’s deathly-still. My ankle’s discolored and grotesquely swollen, the flesh ballooned over my boot shaft. If I take off my boot, I’ll never get it back on again. A terrible thought comes to me. Maybe my boot’s the only thing holding my foot onto my leg.

On the first agonizing step, a small fine snowflake swirls down in front of me. Snowflakes start to fall and quickly accumulate, turning the forest white. A frosty wind rises, howls my ears, and sweeps icily past. Needled ice pricks sting my cheeks. Frost-split trunks and branches splinter sickeningly. Blinded in white glare, I wander around aimlessly, my clothes hardened into frozen shells and my hands numbed. I beat them against my thighs, blanketed in snow. I clamp my jaw shut to stop my teeth from clattering.

I spot a set of footprints on the path ahead and my scalp lifts in fresh fear. I approach them with great trepidation and study them. After a moment, I realize they’re mine—dividing and reconnecting in rambling aimless circles. I’m overcome by a sense of hopelessness, loneliness, and despair. I’m utterly lost and alone. Miserable tears course my chapped cheeks. I can’t take another step. I drop down to my hands and my knees, and drag myself forward like an injured animal, dragging myself on all fours.

Pristine snow beckons, billowy and comforting, and I answer the call. Shivering uncontrollably, I huddle against a large trunk pillowed in snow and hug my knees to my chest. I’m overwhelmed by sleep and tranquilized by an odd feeling of warmth and comfort. This is how I’m going to die. Death’s come for me. I anticipate the end as a quick release. It’ll all be over soon. I’m sorry, Joel. I’m sorry I failed you. Please forgive me. Please have mercy on me. I close my eyes and slip unconscious.


	8. Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight

Dusk sweeps-in, vast and solemn. I light an oil lamp and reheat a double serving of lamb chops in a pan over the cast-iron wood stove. Even when Joel’s gone on solo scout, I prepare hot supper for him and arrange his place setting out of habit, duty, boredom, and superstition.

We live out West in a wild mountainous territory on a small flat surrounded by mountains and cliffs, which provides natural cover from incessant wind, violent storms, and merciless sun. The narrow valley’s enclosed by timbered rolling mountains of fragrant pines and spruces. No roads, no laws. Nothing but a clear peaceful isolated sweep of open land. I always figured we’d live on a big lake on the side of a giant mountain, in a log cabin with a lake full of fish. It’s where I always saw us. But this suits us better. It’s not where I ever thought I’d want to be but it’s where I want to be. I suppose it’s because of Joel. I wouldn’t deny it. With our own hands and know-how, we built a single story double-volume fort-like home of thick grey adobe walls that no bullet can penetrate. It has small square windows and hewn spruce floors joined smoothly, spread with pony-skin and bear-skin rugs. Large unadorned bedrooms open onto an interior courtyard and a narrow veranda with a spruce colonnade rings the front façade.

Joel placed the house around a stone-lined well of sweet cold plentiful water so we’re never cut-off when marauding renegades attack. We’ve already resisted numerous sieges. This place is impenetrable. The well stands in the center of the interior courtyard in a tall cool dark shed with one high window. We store pantry surplus on its stone shelves. It’s also where I go when I’m gripped by attacks of uncontrollable crying. Raging and wailing till I hyperventilate or throw-up, usually both. I try to save them for when he’s gone on solo scout but sometimes I can’t wait. He always bangs on the door till I open it and he holds me tight, soothing me till all my tears are shed. I don’t always remember these fits but I always remember the peculiar look in his eyes. Sometimes they go soft and tender with pity and compassion, and sometimes they’re wide and bewildered. I’ve heard him in there, too, during the longest darkest hours of night, gagging on dry sobs with something stuffed deep in his mouth so he doesn’t wake me up. It’s hard to listen to. I get the horrible feeling I want to cry, too, and my throat gets very tight but I never go to him. I let him shed his tears in private. My company would just embarrass him.

Our closest neighbors were a wild bunch of New Millenniums, who lived in a small mission. Rebels raided it one winter night and killed the clergy, the guards, and the congregation before burning it to the ground. They set fire to the main house and murdered them all as they ran out. I know this because Joel rode over and reconstructed the massacre by the ruins and the lay of the corpses.

I never understood the concept of neighbors before we had our own place. You just want them to mind their own business and leave you alone. One of the priests came to visit one rainy afternoon under the pretense of borrowing our fire. He showed-up with some soggy clergy carrying handwritten Bibles. Joel made me hide in the kitchen cockloft where I could see everything through the keyhole. They spread their Bibles open on the table to a passage in the Book of Psalms, underlined heavily in pencil, ‘The wicked shall be turned into Hell…’ First they asked him if he was a man of God and he was like, ‘I ain’t, it appears like.’ Then they asked him if he went to church and he said he wasn’t much on churches or God or religion. Then they asked him how they could help him and he said if they couldn’t help him scythe the hay or dig-up the crops, no thanks, there was no help to be had. They asked him to join them in prayer and that's when he sent them on their way.

Joel doesn’t believe in God. This isn’t a secret. He says if God existed, He would’ve never let any of this happen in the first place. What kind of God would let his own daughter be killed? What kind of God would let that happen to a child? God would’ve saved the children. Or at the very least, He would’ve saved them from terror and suffering. He would’ve sent down his saints and angels to save them with their swords. Children like his daughter would’ve never been killed if God existed. I don’t tell him this but I believe in God. Not _God_ God, like a merciful reverent God, but my own kind of God. I find myself praying to Him. Or Her. I haven’t decided what my God looks like yet. Please, God, I pray. Please keep us safe and look after us. Now that we have so much, I fear something’ll come and take it away from us. I pray nothing will come and destroy our home. I don’t deserve this home, I think often. I don’t deserve such a nice life with such a good man.

I’m not Joel’s wife and we’re not married but I’m a good woman to him. I do all the things I think a good woman and a good wife should do for the family she lives with. I live with a man and I enjoy it. And on the days I don’t enjoy it, I act like I do. We have separate bedrooms but we sleep with each other and we fuck. He knows I need to be fucked every single day. I’m at his command when he wants his brew-up, his slippers, or his Bible. The Bible isn’t a religious thing. It’s the only book we have. Joel studies it and he encourages me to study it, too, says our house should be a house of learning. He says when you leave this earth, you take nothing with you. Nothing at all. The only things that matter are the things you learned. The lessons you learned in life and the people you loved.

I like to cook and I’m good at it. To prepare a good meal for someone you love is a gift. I find great satisfaction in taking care of him. He spent his whole life taking care of others. He suffered for their wants and needs, and moved heaven and earth for them. He had to take care of everyone—his brother, his ex-wife, his daughter, and me. No ever said to him, ‘Joel, I wanna take care of you.’ He’s so big and strong and capable, I suppose no one ever thought he needed to be taken care of. So I do. And I know he appreciates it.

I lay the lamb chops on a large spruce slab and set it on the long spruce table. We use this table for everything from dining to first aid. You could sit two dozen big men at this table easily. Joel hewed everything from native wood—our bedsteads, workbenches, tables, chairs, stools, and couches. We cover everything in soft warm things such as rabbit fur and buffalo hide blankets, beaver pelts, and feather-stuffed cushions. Various hides adorn the walls—black bear, fox, wolf, and skunk. 

I pull a spruce comb from my hair and shake it loose—long, wavy, and thick. I have time to take care of it now. Though you’d think there’d be lots of free time once the sun goes down but it’s not true. There’s always mending to do, like reinforcing the buttons on our clothes or sweeping-out the dry light gray ash that accumulates on everything. Between evening chores, I’ve been working on a braided hatband for Joel’s Stetson. It’s made of dyed horsehair. I’ll work on it tonight till I fall asleep. _If_ I’m able to sleep. The problem is, I worry when he’s gone. I always make a fuss when he tells me he’s leaving. I get that look on my face. A mix of anxiety and resignation. I can’t help it. ‘You’d think a man’s leaving forever,’ he always says when I make a fuss. I gently remind him he’s getting older. He’s not as young as he used to be. He can’t do the same things he did when he was 40 or even 50. Then I put my arms around him and beg him to stay. But he won’t stay. He can’t stay. He does want he wants but he always comes back. I don’t even think about what would happen if he didn’t come back. It’d be like thinking about what would happen if the sun stopped rising one morning. It’s not a logical thing to waste my time thinking about. What’d be the point? Sometimes he tells me exactly how long he’ll be gone. The longest he ever left was eight days. ‘Eight?’ I yelled in disbelief when he told me. ‘Four out and four back,’ he said in a way that made perfect sense. I can’t help but take it personally. Maybe I bore him. Maybe I talk too much. Maybe he just needs some peace and quiet.

Whenever he’s gone, I leave his place setting at the table, and the fire raked and glowing. I leave out a big pail of sheep’s milk, and fresh biscuits and butter covered in mosquito netting. Sometimes I wait up for him. If I don’t, he always comes and wakes me. I never asked him to do this. It just seemed like something we were supposed to do. He always comes home tired, achy, stiff, and bruised. He’s always famished. After he browses on the sheep’s milk, biscuits, and butter, I sit him at the table and make him supper. I make a great fuss over him, loading-up his plate whenever he takes a bite. He’s usually too tired to speak so I talk to him about this and that, projects I’m working on, things that happened while he was gone, or stuff I read in the Bible. After he eats, he soaks in the big tin bath, and scrubs himself from head to toe while I inspect his dirty clothes for mending and washing. After his bath, he sinks into his chair by the fire or retires to his bedroom where he sleeps until the next day.

Dusk’s last light fades into darkness, which means it’s time to start my evening chores. It’s against the rules to go outside after nightfall. If I want fresh air after dark, I’m restricted to the interior courtyard. Joel’s cautious of what the darkness brings such as the packs of large timber wolves that scurry past our door most nights, but he’s not here so I can do whatever I want! I grab my rifle and head for the front door where I unbolt the wooden securing bar, unlock the big iron hook, and step-out onto the narrow veranda. Candlelight from the house’s small square windows casts the colonnade in warm amber light. If Joel were sitting out here with me, I’d only be able to make-out the planes of his jaw and his cheekbones. I dust-off one of the slab benches with the flat of my hand and sit. I hike-up my long full homespun skirt up around my waist and lay my cold rifle horizontally across my thighs. Beyond the veranda, the night stretches dark and silent. An early full moon casts a silvery milky sheen across the land, and the sky is luminous and hazy with infinite stars. Not a sound echoes across the vast flat. Everything’s calm and serene.

Joel and I’ve made a nice simple life here. He said it was the kind of place he’d been looking for his whole life. When I look at the house from the outside among its surroundings, it looks like it’s been here since the beginning of time. Like it belongs here. We don’t have much but what we have belongs to us and we can only thank ourselves for it. It’s a very proud feeling to own something and to own something as nice as this. We keep our house neat, tidy, and clean. This goes against common sense. You should never make your home look too neat or too clean. If it looks too inviting, you’re inviting danger to your door. You should put horse shit and broken rotted things outside your door. If you don’t, you’ll attract those who want to take it from you. We don’t need to do this because Joel can defeat anyone or anything who tries to take it away from us!

We live off the land. The well for fresh water, irrigation for crops, and pumps to draw it to the house for sanitation. We have a small vegetable garden and a couple of sheds including one for a golden Palomino stallion named Honor, which Joel took on scout. We raise chickens, sheep, and rabbits. I take the sheep to pasture with a tall staff and tie a red handkerchief around the top so Joel can always find me up in the mountains. We have a special whistle for when we need to call each other across the distance. Most of our clothes are made from bagged game and homespun wool—tanned buckskin shirts and pants, raccoon fur slippers, and moose hide moccasins sewed with animal sinew, like the ones I’m wearing. Joel made them for me. If I go to bed without them, I always find them at my bedside when I wake-up. He doesn’t want me to have cold feet, even if I have to use the bidet in the middle of the night.

I look out across the distance and something stirs a couple miles away. I pull to my feet and hold onto one of the large spruce columns. The movement coalesces into a travelling dust cloud. How strange, I think to myself. It couldn’t be cattle. It’s moving too fast and cattle wouldn’t stampede on such a cool clear calm night. It has to be horses. It could be a rider—maybe Joel returning home on Honor—though when he left this morning, he said he’d be going pretty far, which always means he won’t return before the evening of the next day. It couldn’t be him unless he ran into trouble but I always know in my gut when he’s in trouble and I don’t feel this. 

I watch the dust cloud as it snakes along the base of a small range, heading west. Over the dead silence comes the sound of distant rolling thunder—horse hooves. No doubt it’s horses! Soon enough, a mass of riders coalesces, faintly outlined against the deep dark sky, bunched like cavalry—a good sign—because raiders, outlaws, renegades, and rebels usually ride single-file. Though night riders are always dangerous. Wolves in the night. It takes a very tough type of rider to navigate these lands—wild broken rough open country. Miles of sheer rugged mountains and bleak treacherous dark canyons. Wanted men hide-out in them and an entire battalion wouldn’t be able to find them.

Halfway down the mountain range, the dust cloud turns and heads straight toward me, streaming across the valley. They must’ve spotted the candlelit windows. Adrenaline brightens my eyes in vigilance. If Joel were here, he’d command me to strike off the lights and hide in the small tin-lined cellar pantry below the kitchen floor where we store surplus grain, medicine, and cured moose and venison, while he braced for whatever was coming. But I’m confident I can handle it myself so I conceal myself behind a column with my rifle slung to low alert.

I watch as they draw closer, a dozen horsemen riding abreast. They gradually slow their horses and halt in front of the house in an eruption of dust and thundering hooves. I draw-up my rifle and level it at them, my finger massaging the trigger and my eyes watering from the heavy dust. No one speaks or moves. The only sound is the restless scuff of hooves, the creak of saddles, the jingle of bit rings and spurs, and the huff of horse breath. The horses are strong, tall, and well-bred. The riders are wild, virile, and deeply bronzed. They sit quietly on their horses, watchful and silent with sober vigilant eyes. They’re tall, broad-shouldered and slim-waisted, and they’re heavily armed. Each one carries multiple assault rifles in slings strapped to their saddles. They wear cartridge bandoliers loosely draped over their chests and ammo belts across their waists. There’s no uniformity in their dress—camo, utility, denim, and moto—but the worn look to their clothes and the high shine on the insides of their boots tells me they’ve ridden far and hard. As the dust blows and settles, they pull down their handkerchiefs and shemaghs from their noses and mouths, revealing beardless faces.

Front and center of the cavalry is their leader, no doubt about it. He sits on a tall grey horse with one leg thrown over the high pommel of his saddle and the wide brim of his Stetson pulled low over his face. His manner’s aloof, unconcerned, and indifferent. He tips back the brim of his hat and our eyes connect. He’s smooth-faced with cold hard fearless eyes. His long hair’s bleached light in sun and wind. My heart skips a beat and my lips work soundlessly. “Tommy?” I ask, my voice coming out in a hoarse choked whisper. It can’t be him. It can’t be him. He grins warm and wide. It's him! “God! Tommy! God!” I cut toward the stairs but I have to halt on the top step because my legs are too weak to continue. I fight the urge to sink to my knees and tighten my jaw to keep from crying.

He dismounts and strides toward me with the exaggerated bow-legged swagger of a man who’s spent his life in the saddle. He’s putting on a show for me! He halts in front of me, takes-off his Stetson, and bows low and respectful, his brim sweeping the ground. “Well, I’m back!” he says with a laugh. “And I’m mighty glad about it!” He swings me down from the step and pulls me into an embrace. I cling to him, crying and laughing. I bury my face into his dust-caked neck, inhaling his familiar scent of leather and dirt. He holds me at arm’s length and we search each other’s eyes, wide in disbelief. Waves of relief wash over me, mixed with unbridled joy. “I thought you were dead,” I say.

“Hell wouldn’t keep me from you!” he laughs.

“I thought Joel—”

“Where’s that miserable old sonofabitch?” he interrupts with a mocking smile, his eyes twinkling good humor.

“Your brother took to it again,” I say.

“Some kinda fit?” he asks.

“Ran off this morning.”

“Chasing wild horses?”

“Said he had some particular business to look after,” I say. He holds me by the waist and kisses my forehead, inhaling deep. “Good,” he says. “I’m wanting you all to myself.” He turns to his riders and addresses them, “Boys, go stretch your legs!” The men dismount and draw their horses’ reins under their arms. Some lift their saddles and hoist them over their shoulders, their long spurs jangling musically as they walk away.

Tommy and I stare at each other, neither of us moving nor speaking. He’s in worn grey denim from head to toe with a large dark shemagh draped loosely around his neck, and black boots with silver spurs and large-toothed rowels. He wears two heavy bandolier cartridge belts crossed over his chest and two ammo belts slung low around his hips with large-handled revolvers in leather holsters tied down to his thighs. I search his eyes. They seem teary. “Are you crying?” I ask and his mouth pulls into a twitching smile. “Just the dust from the long ride,” he says.

“It doesn’t show,” I say. He takes me under his arm and leads me toward the door. I hold-up my skirt from the ground with my free hand so it doesn’t sweep the dust.


	9. Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

Tommy bows his head as he walks through the low front doorway, just like Joel. He takes off his Stetson, the imprint of the hatband scored deep into his sweaty hair, and hangs it on the deer-antler rack by the front door, the same peg where Joel hangs his when he’s home.

The second I shut the front door, he tugs at my skirt and lifts it up till his hands are on my ass. He pulls down my panties and I grab at his collar, trying to pull off his shirt, but there’s too much rigging holding it down. My hands go to his fly and I pull out his cock. I wrap my fingers around it and squeeze it tight. I never want to let go. I squeeze it so hard his balls must ache. I need to be fucked so badly, there’s no time to undress. The ache between my legs feels unstable, like a bomb about to go off. I’m ready to come before we’ve even fucked.

He backs me against the table and I lay back over it, spread my legs wide, and dig my heels into the ledge. I tuck up my skirt around my waist and grab at him, grabbing his bandoliers, trying to pull him down and keep him close, and begging him to fuck me. He fumbles with the buckles of his cartridge belts and holsters till they crash to the floor. He takes my legs, pulls them wide apart, and takes a good look at my twat. I keep it shaved completely bare. He’s very quiet as he takes it all in. He holds his cock in his hand, runs the tip between my split, squeezes it in, and fucks the rest of himself in after it. It sucks the breath out of me. He sets himself deep and slowly starts to fuck me. He fucks me on the table where we eat our meals, my bare ass right over the spot where Joel and I eat dinner. I don’t care. I’d lay on a bed of nails and broken glass to feel his cock inside me again.

I wrap my legs around him and get a solid hold of him so he can’t get away. I grab his bandoliers and pull him down by his rigging, and open my hips as wide as they’ll go, fucking myself against him. I beg him to give me more, to fuck himself deeper, to fuck me harder. I want him to bury his cock as deep as his arm. He sets himself deeper and I squeal. I can’t keep myself still, squirming and wiggling beneath him. I pull down his head and shove my tongue in his mouth. He tastes like dust, horses, and dirt. His lips taste like brine and sweat. He pulls away from my lips. He wants to watch himself fuck me and he does. I keep my legs wrapped around his hips and I never want to let him go. I want his cock and his whole body inside me till he fills me completely. He puts both arms around me, holding me under my ass, and he slowly fucks me, my legs spread wide open by the thighs. He slips-in a finger without taking-out his cock and continues to fuck me. I tell him I’m going to come and he stuffs his finger deeper. He keeps his cock stuffed inside me and pushes his finger deeper every time I cry-out. He fucks me for another minute till he starts filling me with his hot thick come.

When he stops coming, he leans over me with his weight on his hands, his palms spread downward on the table. He takes a moment to catch his breath and smiles disarmingly, his blond hair falling across his face in boyish disorder. I wrap him in my arms and kiss him. I love you, Tommy, I tell him silently. As sure as God’s in Heaven, I love you. You were my first—and if I could choose, you’d be my last. We stay like this till his cock gets very soft and very wet, and he slips out. He offers me his hand and pulls me up from the tabletop. I perch the ledge, rearrange my skirt, and groom my wild hair into order. He adjusts his bandoliers across his chest, his armpits blossomed in large dark sweat stains. His whole body’s coated in fine powder. It’s settled deeply into the sweaty lines of his face and the wrinkles of his clothes. “Ride far?” I ask.

“Not very far,” he says.

“Gonna stick around?”

“I haven’t given it much thought.”

“Headed west?”

“Might could be.”

“You’ll take Devil’s Canyon?”

“No way around it.”

“Come across a lotta trouble out there?”

“Not much to speak of,” he says. I smile mischievously and ask, “Can I come with you?” He laughs good-naturedly at this and asks, “Still lonesome to run with the boys?”

“Just you,” I say.

“You know it ain’t no place for a woman out there. You’ve gotta play by a man’s rules or you’ll lose right quick. Besides, I reckon Joel’s built you a respectable home, found you a nice place to settle.” He smiles wistfully and glances around the large central room with its big flagstone fireplace, spruce furniture, and pony-skin carpets. A single kerosene lamp suspends the ceiling and casts us in its yellow glow. “Looks like you’ve got everything you want here.”

“I do now,” I say and we share a smile. He continues, “I reckon he wanted to give you all the things he didn’t have himself. He must resent himself for what he brought about.”

“It’s only natural,” I say.

“Is it lonesome out here?”

“Not too lonesome.”

“The monotony, the emptiness. Does it ever feel oppressive?”

“He keeps me busy,” I say.

“What do you do with your time?” he asks.

“Nothing much.”

“No rules? No restrictions but your own desires?”

“Joel’s rules.”

“Simple enough?”

“They don’t suit me. I have my own thoughts and my own life to live. I wanna figure it out myself.”

“Well, it’s no business of mine, but I reckon you’ve got every right to do all the things you wanna do,” he says and draws me into his arms. We stay like this for a long time, taking-in each other’s familiar smells and feeling our full lengths pressed against each other. It feels like he was never gone, like he just stepped out for a moment and returned. I pull away and take his face in my hand. He nuzzles into my palm and kisses it. “You must be hungry after such a long ride,” I say. “How ’bout some food and drink? It’ll be ready by the time you wash-up. We don’t have much but we’ve got soap!”

“Then I’mma give myself a hell of a going over with it!” he says with a laugh. He’s pleased to be here, pleased with the comforts of our home and it makes me very happy. I help him strip-off his load-out and pop off his boots, scarred and scratched, the insteps almost worn through from the stirrups. “Reckon it’s time for a new pair,” he says sheepishly, his spurs softly jingling as I set them on the floor. I send him to the bathroom to erase the dust and dirt of his long journey, and I hang his heavy bandoliers and cartridge belts on the wall pegs with his Stetson. Everything smells like him, damp with the smell of his sweat.

All these years. All these long years. He slipped away from me like a ghost. I’ve thought about him so much and longed for him at my side, knowing the day would never come. I was full of futile yearning and oppressive heartbreak. I suppose I should thank whichever God revives the dead and raises them from their graves, but I knew he wasn’t dead. Not him. Not Tommy Miller. He’s too vital and too virile to die. Now that he’s back, I never want him to leave. Stay with me, Tommy, I tell him silently. Stay the night. Your boys can sleep in the courtyard and listen to us fuck all night long. Let them watch if they want. Let the whole world watch.

The scent of frying bacon and corn husk cigarettes wafts through the windows. Strains of men’s laughter and voices float across the dark expanse. I look out the window, which opens onto a broad view of the range. Tommy’s riders stand around a blazing campfire, smoking, talking, and laughing. The horses have been unsaddled, unbridled, and watered, and turned-out into an improvised corral of rope stretched around various trees.

I light the wood stove and refry the lamb chops with corn bread and applesauce, and simmer some chicory brew-up. When Tommy finishes bathing, he joins me in the kitchen where he leans against the long workbench and watches me cook with a faint dazed smile. I can smell our cedar soap coming off his skin. He’s brushed the dust from his clothes, combed his hair, and scrubbed his face clean. Though he's a bit weathered by the sun, wind, and passage of time, his manner is as bold and authoritative as it was at Jackson. He’s full of good humor and boyish charm. My eyes fill with tears at seeing him at my side again. “Are you crying?” he asks. “It’s the onions,” I say but this is a lie. We don’t grow onions. He peers into the frying pan and says, “I don’t see any onions.” I don’t respond, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand. He laughs and says, “Well, you won’t have to salt the lamb chops, it appears like.” I laugh at this joke, appreciative of his humor. “So, what do you do now?” I ask.

“I ride,” he says.

“You ride?”

“I carry a gun,” he says and I laugh. Same old Tommy. “Who’re your riders?” I ask.

“My gang,” he says.

“Your gang?” I ask and he laughs good-naturedly. “Does your gang have a name?” I ask.

“The Hell’s Rangers!” he yells, and I laugh loud and free. “Raising thunder!” he yells with a laugh. “We’re out here ruckusing and scaring honest folks to death, turning this country upside-down.”

“What are they like?” I ask.

“They ain’t your kind nor the kind you think they are. They’re wild but they know how to act like gentleman.”

“Bandits?” I ask.

“No secret about it! Every man’s a fighter!”

“Outlaws?” 

“Desperados! We’re generally law-abiding but we’re hell on raiders. Traders and black marketers running merch. Drifters bound for the borders and coasts. We always get 'em. We lay in wait, ambush 'em, take their haul, and kill 'em. Bury them in the ground and round-up their frightened horses.”

“Bounty hunting?” I ask.

“We do a little bit of everything. Trouble hunting, gun fighting, outlawing, thieving, raiding. We take what we want, free as we please. We ain’t denied nothing. Folks generally ain't fussing with us. They know what’ll happen if they get to crowding us.”

“Do you have a hang-out?” I ask.

He looks around the house and says, “I reckon this’ll do!”

I arrange his meal over a spruce slab, pour him an enamelware mug of steaming brew-up, and we head to the couch. I imagine he hasn’t felt anything soft under his bottom in a long, long time. I know I’m right when he sits and sighs deep contentment. I sit next to him and lay my legs over his lap. His nearness is driving me crazy. One fucking won’t be enough for me tonight, that’s for sure. He draws-up my skirt and feels-up my thighs with his free hand, eating unhurriedly with the other. It makes me very happy to see him eat my food. He takes my hand in his and kisses it. “It does my heart mighty good to see you,” he says. “Time’s made a woman outta you. Your eyes are wiser, more serene. Your innocence’s gone. You look a little faded—your hair and your eyes.”

“It’s all the sun and wind out here,” I say and study his face. I suppose he’s less cold and reckless than he was at Jackson. I’m glad he got out. He was too wild and spirited to spend his life in captivity. He was made for a life of adventure in wide open spaces. It’s where he belongs. “You seem quieter and more confident,” I say. “At ease. Age has taken the edge offa your eyes. Something happened out there?”

“I’ve been some places and seen some things. I’ve done some things I probably shouldn’t have done.”

“How the hell did you find me?” I ask.

“This country ain’t so big. Folks you’re looking for can almost always be found.”

“I can’t believe you’re here. I thought—”

He interrupts me, “I reckon that old sonofabitch bashed me over the head a couple times to make sure I wouldn’t be none active for a while.” He's taking about Joel, how Joel tried to kill him. I’ll never forget that night, never forget what happened. I don’t blame him for trying to kill me. He’s a man of his word and he said he’d do it. “I expect you’ve been sorrowing over it?” he asks.

“We left you for dead,” I say.

“It was a mighty mean way to beat a man. Joel carved me up some and I wasn’t all that pretty when he was through but I’ve healed.” He works the top buttons of his denim shirt down his chest and draws the collar aside, revealing a thick flat dark scar where Joel had stabbed him. It’s placed too high to be fatal but it couldn’t have been any closer. It must’ve been a tough painful recovery. I finger the scar and ask, “Now that you’re healed, have you come back to settle things between you and him?” He looks at me directly and says, “I came to see you.”

“Not to settle a score with him?”

“I ain’t reckoning to. I ain’t interested in what happened in the past. It doesn’t make any difference to me. There was a time not too long ago when I thought Joel would look a lot better dead than alive but time’s got a funny way of making things feel different.” No matter what he says, I know it’s inevitable that one day they’ll have to settle their differences. Their hatred for each other’s like a strong poison. Some day when it grows more virulent, they’ll clash again. I’m convinced of the eventuality of it. “Has that old sonofabitch given you everything you wanted?” he asks.

“He’s changed, Tommy.”

“That’s inevitable. Age’s numbed him quiet as a nun?”

“He’s watchful. Observant. He looks harassed. I think settling down after all those years drifting made him restless.” I feel like once the house went up, Joel lost momentum, like a ship adrift. Aimless. No plans. All he has to look forward to is getting older. I worry the decision to settle down was wrong. When he was sick or wounded in the past, he knew he’d be laid-up for a certain amount of time, but retirement’s forever. “Reckon his nights are getting monotonous, yeah?” he asks. “No excitement? No nothing?”

“Sometimes he tells me stories about your outlaw days and he gets that look in his eyes.”

“Did he tell you the one about Slim Evans?”

“He told me about Slim Evans.”

“I can still hear that Mexican’s slug rattling around his lungs. Poor bastard bled to death in the saddle. Did he tell you about the McCarson showdown?” he asks. I nod my head, yes, and say, “He even told me about the Durango cabin blackjack.” Tommy laughs freely and says, “A bitch’s gamble!”

I glance at Joel’s chair, a great spruce lounger with thick moose-hide cushions stuffed with down. “He sits in that chair all night,” I say. “Sometimes he sleeps in it. With his rifle.”

“Dreaming about all his big adventures. Still a light sleeper?”

“He hears everything. Wide awake in an instant.”

“A life of sleeping out in the open. Nothing gets past him.”

“He keeps running off. He disappears for days.”

“Give him some time. He’ll show up. He’d never leave you to fight this place alone.”

“I worry he’s looking for something physical. I worry he’s back to mourning her.” _Her_ meaning Sarah. Here’s something to know about Joel. Sometimes he comes home from solo scout injured and limping with his clothes torn, his hands filthy, and scratches all over his face like he’s been riding wild in the thick brush. I don’t know what it’s all about and it scares me. The first time it happened, I asked him what happened and he pretended he had no idea what I was talking about. ‘How’d that happen?’ he said and looked at his torn bloody clothes like it was nothing. That’s as far as it went. I told myself he must’ve been distracted and wasn’t looking where he was going but after it happened a second time, I knew it wasn’t a mistake.

“Joel’s the same man today as he was a hundred years ago,” Tommy says. “He’s one of those men who don’t let anything come between them and the thing they want.”

“I wish he’d tell me what he wanted.”

“I reckon that’s between you and him.”

“Tommy,” I say and look down at my lap, lacing and unlacing my fingers. “I wanna apologize.”

“What happened?”

“For coming between you two.”

“It ain’t a big deal.”

“I still think about it.”

“You’re presuming a lot if you think it fusses me up. I deserved punishment. I was wild. I couldn’t be tamed. I suppose I treated you badly, too, but I was always worried about something. Them mountain folks are difficult. It wasn’t easy. It took a lotta time for them to trust and accept me. Those kinda folks can’t be converted overnight to new ideas. Won’t you forgive me?”

My heart knifes with the understanding things have changed immeasurably since Jackson and they’ll never be the same again. “There’s nothing to forgive,” I say, my voice soft with tears. I cover my face with my hands and start to cry. He takes me in his arms and holds me tight. “Why are you crying?” he asks.

“I’m…not…crying,” I gasp between sobs. He pushes back the hair from my face, kisses my forehead, and says, “Well, don’t waste your tears on me. You shouldn’t cry over me. You don’t like me that much, do you?” I wipe the tears from my cheeks with the backs of my hands and say, “I hate you,” with a tender twitching smile. He laughs softly at this and says, “I always figured you liked me. Though I ain’t foolish enough to think you loved me—though I always hoped you did.” I’m dying to tell him I love him but I can’t. The moment I say those precious words, that person will abandon me or die. “I like you a powerful lot,” he continues. “And I’mma marry you one day like I told you. How’d you like to be Mrs. Tommy Miller?”

“I suppose I have no say in the matter?” I tease.

“Of course you do. You’re gonna say yes.” We share a smile and he pulls me into an embrace. I listen to the blood pounding his heart and the breath in his lungs, and I sigh contentedly. I never want him to let me go. “You know it doesn’t take long for me to get a man’s measure,” he says. “I always size 'em up right. I sized you up right the first time I laid eyes on you.”

“Is that right?” I ask.

“We were meant for each other.”

“But I don’t know that much about you, Tommy,” I tease.

“You know I’m a gentleman.”

“Most men are. I’ll bet most of your riders are, too.”

“Unlike them, you know who I am and where I come from.”

“I’ve heard some things about the Miller boys.”

“I always figured you wanted my brother,” he says. “He never had no idea why the ladies went for him, said he was just doing what came natural. Figured they saw something in him that wasn’t him. It goes against his grain pretending to be someone he ain’t. I reckon it’s different with you and him. He won’t ever give you up. He ain’t that type. He’ll fight for you and he’ll have you. Be gentle with that sonofabitch. Them little things folks call flaws won’t ever stop casting big ugly shadows across his path. Promise me that.”


	10. Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten

Tommy pulls me from his chest and holds me at arm’s length. I can tell by the look on his face something weighs heavily on his mind and he’s working-up the nerve to ask me. His lips twitch a bit but it’s taking him too long, so I ask him, “What is it, Tommy?”

“Do you receive other men?” he asks. “Or am I the only one?” I laugh dryly at this. So that’s what he wants to know? I say to him, “There’s no one out here but me and Joel. And the wolves.”

“That’s what I’m asking about. Does Joel ever look at you like a woman? Does he ever blush around you? Get dreamy-eyed? Mope around?”

“Joel’s Joel.”

“What’s life like here with him?”

“I told you. It’s fine.”

“Do you make a fuss over him? Does he fuss around you? Do you come and go when he does? Do you make his meals and make them whenever he wants? Do you keep the light burning for him even if he doesn’t come home at night? Do you always make yourself look nice for him? Do you feel like he watches you when you ain’t looking?”

“Why do you care?” I ask.

“You’ve always been too good to him. Too kind and patient, like a mother with a child. Joel’s a fool with women. He’d be lost without you. I wonder if he realizes that.”

I say Tommy's name and drop my eyes. I want to come clean. I want to tell him about me and Joel. That we fuck ourselves out on each other. I feel like it's something he should know. “What’s doing?” he asks. I don’t respond, working up the nerve to tell him. “Spit it out,” he says.

“We fuck.”

“You and him?” he asks and I nod my head, yes. His cheeks stain dark and his eyes flash belligerence. “Is that a joke?” he asks. He’s jealous! I’ve made him jealous. And I like it! Why shouldn’t I? I never made him jealous before. So what’s changed? “I wouldn't lie to you,” I say.

“When?” he asks.

“Whenever we feel like it.”

“Ellie, I’m warning you—”

I cut him off, saying, “He does whatever I ask him,” and I smile mischievously. His jaw sweeps into a firm demanding line. “Ellie,” he says, his tone disdainful. “Do you need to be punished?”

“Depends who’s punishing me.”

“Do you miss the taste of my belt?” he asks and I exhale brightly. “Yes, Tommy,” I say, breathless. I picture his big hands laying into my ass cheeks till they’re shiny, hot, and red, and I feel that ache fire-up between my thighs. “I’m sure Joel would agree with me,” he says. “You need some punishing for what you’ve done.”

“He tried,” I say.

“He was bound to get you sooner or later. I figured he’d stop putting up with your nonsense and discipline you proper.”

“He used his hand.”

He scoffs and says, “Naughty girls oughta be treated like naughty girls.”

“Yes, Tommy,” I say, breathless, dying to feel the weight of his hand on my ass. “I’mma give that tight little ass a roasting,” he says. “Would you like that?”

“Yes, Tommy! Yes!” I start squirming all over the couch. I can’t hold myself still. “Put you across my knee?” he asks and I yell, “Yes, Tommy!”

“I reckon I can oblige you.” He yanks his belt through his waistband and brandishes it in his hand. “Get in position, child.” I scramble from the couch and set myself between his legs. I press my body against him and strip down to my panties but I leave them on because I want to feel him take them off me. I lift my belly toward him, and he kisses and nips at it. He takes a breast into his hand and pushes it against my chest. He buries his face between them, licking and kissing the valley. I hold his head against my chest and dig around his hair. “Have you been naughty, child?” he asks, licking, kissing, and sucking my breasts and belly. He slips his hand beneath my panties and rests his fingertips over my bare mound. Everything he does drives me wild. “Yes,” I say, gasping, urging against his hand. “But I’m almost a woman.”

“Almost,” he says. “You’re still a young woman.”

“I’m big enough to be fucked like a real woman,” I say and he exhales brightly. He takes me by the waist and leads me over his lap. I lay across it and pitch my bottom high over his right knee, my breasts jutting past his thighs and my body resting over the couch cushion. I straighten my legs and push-off on my toes, urging my ass closer to his face. He takes a cheek into his hand and squeezes it, and it fits perfectly in his palm. I nuzzle my ass against his hand and beg him to take off my panties. He slips his fingers below the waistband and slowly slides them down my thighs, his hands tickling my skin. After he works them off, I hoist my ass higher and spread my legs wide. “I’ve missed this ass,” he says. “It’s just asking to be spanked. Perfect thighs and nice plump cheeks.” He pats each one, the bouncy flesh jiggling in response. “You know I don’t really wanna hurt you, yeah? I just love watching you squeal and wiggle your ass. I love watching it turn pink.” He holds me over his lap by my shoulder. I take a deep breath and his hand comes down across the squishiest jiggliest swell of both cheeks. Crack! I gasp and jolt forward. Bright fresh pain stings my bottom. I squeal pleasure and wiggle across his lap. He smacks me a dozen more times along the sensitive sides, tops, and bottoms of my cheeks.

“Wait till you see what comes next,” he says. He increases the urgency and tempo of his smacks, his hand landing in the same tender spot over my tingling cheeks. A hot burning throb slowly blazes down my thighs, driving me wild. After another minute or so of spanking, he asks, “Ready for my belt?” I go very quiet and start breathing heavy. God, I’ve missed his belt. Joel doesn’t spank me. He wouldn’t, not even if I begged him. Tommy flicks his belt lightly over the backs of my thighs and I moan anguish. “First stroke, coming-up!” Crack! The lash bites the fleshiest crests of my ass with a bright fresh sting. I suck-in my breath with a sharp hiss and jolt forward. I clench and unclench my ass cheeks, and sway my hips from side to side.

“Who’s been a bad girl?” he asks. Crack! The stroke lands across the center of my backside, nipping both ass cheeks. I gasp, jerk-up my head, and kick-out a leg. “I have!” I yell, quaking over his lap. “I’ve been a bad girl!” “Who’s getting her ass smacked?” Crack! The lash bites higher. I cry out desperately and strain-up on my tiptoes, my legs kicking high. I buck wildly over his lap, wriggling my bottom. “I am! I’m getting my ass smacked!” “Who’s never gonna be a bad girl again?” Crack! The belt falls hard and quick across my left thigh, just below the cheek. I shriek and thrash wildly, my legs lifting higher. The skin on the back of my thighs and bottom stretches drum tight. “Never bad again!” “What do you say for smacking your ass?” Crack! His belt comes down swift over my right thigh in the same tender spot as the left. I wail and hammer my hips. “Thank you, Tommy! Thank you!” “What’ll happen if you’re bad again?” Crack! The lash comes down right above the backs of my knees. I shriek, whipping my head and jerking my bottom from side-to-side. My entire body shudders. I push-up on my toes, my legs locked and quivering. “Spank me, Tommy, spank me!” “Again!” Crack! The lash blazes across my flesh, radiating deep fire from cheek to cheek in a slow throbbing burn. I shriek, holding back sobs. “Spank me, Tommy, spank me!” “Again!” Crack! His belt lands heavy and quick over the small of my back. I howl agony as fresh bright pain explodes and ripples through my body. I can’t take any more. I start to sob, “Stop, Tommy, stop! I’ll be good! I promise!”

He tosses down his belt. He pulls me into his arms and holds me tight as I cry, pushing the hair back from my forehead. He kisses the tears from my cheeks until he reaches my lips, and we kiss with open mouths and twisting tongues. I squirm across his lap and squeeze his thighs between mine, rubbing myself all over him as we kiss, playing with myself against his leg. I can’t hold myself still. I’m so wet between my thighs that when I rub myself against him, I leave little wet spots all over his jeans. I tug at his fly and work my fingers into it until his cock springs out. It’s already in good shape to give me a good hard fucking. I sit down on his lap and wrap my legs around his waist. I take his cock in my hand and push it between my thighs. I sit on it without putting it inside me and move my hips like I’m slowly fucking him. I rock back and forth and up and down without it ever going in. I could come just like this.

He plays with my twat as I fuck myself over his lap. “Is Joel a good fuck?” he asks me through kisses along my neck and jaw. “Does he fuck as good as me? Do you make him eat you out? Do you suck his dick? Do you swallow his load? Do you 69 with him? Do you give him anal? Does he ask you to play with his ass? Does he come inside you? Does he ever talk about me? Does he ever talk about other women he’s fucked?” I take his cock in my hand and push the head against my little hole, tickling my split, and he finally shuts-up. I open my legs as far apart as they’ll go and spread myself open with my fingers. I set the head where I need it and slowly inch down his shaft with a wiggle of my hips. Every time I buck, I stuff him a little bit deeper. I do this till none of his cock’s left outside of my body. His hands go around my waist and mine go to his shoulders.

I hold onto him tight and start to slowly fuck him. He doesn’t even have to do a damn thing but sit there and take my fucking. He watches me with glassy eyes as I fuck myself over him. I grasp at him and wrap my arms around him, pulling his head into my chest, trying to pull him closer. I want to come like this and I don’t want him to change anything up, don’t want him to pop himself out. I want to ride him all night but I can tell he’s going to come. I start to feel him filling me with his come and I come, too, fucking it deep inside me. I keep fucking him long after the sensation of my orgasm’s gone. I don’t want to take him out. I want to hold onto our fucking and remember this night forever. It might never come again. I ride him till he gets very soft and very wet, and he slips out. He shifts me from his lap and pulls to his feet. He doesn’t need to tell me he’s going. I can see it in his eyes and feel it in his manner. No, I beg him silently. Not yet. Please, not yet. “No, Tommy,” I beg, on the verge of tears. “Not yet. Please don’t go.”

He ignores my pleas, and silently pulls on his clothes and steps into his boots. He takes my face in his hands and kisses my forehead, inhaling deep. I suppose he’s taking-in my smell to remember me long after I’m gone. He goes to the front door, his spurs jingling softly. I don’t want him to see me like this, crying like a child, but I can’t control myself. I don’t bother wiping the tears from my face. “Tommy, not yet,” I beg, my voice soft, and the words catching in my throat. “Please don’t go. Stay here with me.”

His eyes are clear and his face is solemn. He won’t change his mind. He pulls his cartridge belts from the pegs and buckles them on. He takes his hat from the deer horn peg and dangles it in his hand. He looks at me directly. His lips twitch a bit. There’s something he wants to tell me but he doesn’t quite know how to say it. He finally gets it out, “Before I go, I’m spilling something to you. Let’s get this straight between us. I love you. I need you. I’ve loved you since the first day I saw you. Maybe you’ve got different ideas about it but I’ve got them, too. One day, I’ll be coming back to visit. I’ve come very far to see you and I’ll be seeing you again real soon.” Soon. Soon is never. Soon never comes. “I mean to have you and I’mma have you,” he says. “And don’t you forget it.”

He unbolts the securing bar from the door and stands in the doorway, looking out into the night. He turns to look at me one last time. “You tell him I was here,” he says, meaning Joel. “Remember it. Tell him. Let him never rest easy again. I’ll be coming back. You tell him this. It might be tomorrow or next week or next year but you tell him. Tell him I’ll be seeing him. Tell him he’d best keep looking over his shoulder for Tommy and his Hell’s Rangers!”

He walks into the night, shutting the door firmly behind him. My heart knifes and I weep freely. His departure feels like the coldest bleakest moment of the darkest hour of night. His voice comes through the windows as he rouses his riders, “Rise and shine, boys! Ready to ride!” The air stirs with men’s voices, the shuffling of horse hooves, the jingle of spurs, and the creaking of leather as the riders prepare to depart. “Hitting the breeze quite early, Chief,” a baritone voice says to him. “Looking for more strays?”

“I ain’t reckoning to,” he says. “They’re rather scarce.”

“All I need’s a horse between my legs,” the voice says, “and a sweet baby beef at the end of my rope.”

“You know how much I love a good hunt,” Tommy says. “And I always get my game.”

“Texas always gets ‘em…”

–––––––

I rouse as something hard jabs my shoulder. I try to open my eyes but I can’t. Why can’t I open my eyes? It slowly comes to me. The snow. My eyes are weighted down with snow. The last thing I remember was wandering around the snow. Heavy footfalls crunch around me. These are the footfalls of a big young man. I’m sure of this. What would anyone be doing out in this weather, I think to myself.

Large hands brush the thick snow crusts from my face. I try to open my eyes till I’m finally able to get them open. A tall broad fair man stands in front of me. He wears a long dark wool coat with brass buttons, its generous hood pulled low over his head like a medieval monk. He holds an engraved shotgun by its blued barrel in a leather-gloved hand. A wooly black Friesian stands at his back, its eyes white with frost and its heavy mane silver with snow. Steam rises from its large noble head and flat nostrils. It’s a very beautiful horse. “Sure ain’t proper weather to be tempting Providence,” the man says with a little laugh. This is a rural voice, full of good humor. He’s trying to make a joke. Why would anyone make a joke at a time like this? He’s either a lunatic or lonely, but I’m too dazed, weak, and numb to care. “Do I scare you?” he asks.

“Yes,” I say.

“I don’t mean to.” His voice matches his face—blandly handsome. His coloring is fair and his eyes are creased in good humor. “What’s your name and where are you from?”

“Are you gonna kill me?” I ask.

“Only if you want me to!” he laughs. If I could groan, I would. His sense of humor will kill me before the hypothermia does. “I don’t want any trouble,” I say, my voice thin and my teeth chattering wildly. I can see the breath steaming out of my mouth. All I want to do is go back to sleep so I can be with Tommy. All I want is to think about the two of us in the little grey adobe house Joel and I built. “Please go away,” I say. “Please leave me alone. Let me sleep.”

“You sure picked a hell of a place for napping-up!” he says with a laugh. He finds this whole thing amusing. I suppose I should feel pleased to give him so much entertainment during such a bad storm. What he doesn’t understand is that I’m perfectly happy to stay here in my blanket of snow with the memories of Tommy fresh in my head. If I’m going to die, I don’t want to be taken somewhere else to do it. It’s not that I care I’m dying, I just don’t want to have to get up to do it.

He slips an arm around my waist and pulls me to my feet. I’m too weak to resist. Leave me alone, I yell at him silently. Leave me to die here. Let me have a quick death. The snow will preserve my body perfectly till the spring thaw. No rot, no bloating. A nice pretty death. “Let me die in peace!” I yell. “This ain’t about you!” he answers. “I won’t have your death on my hands. It’s bad manners to die on someone else’s hands, yeah? You wanna die, do it in private, on your own land!” I was trying to do exactly that, I say to him silently, before you came along and interrupted me. “How ‘bout this?” he continues. “I’ll bring you somewhere warm and when you get nice and toasty, I’ll put you right back beneath this tree and you can stay as long as you want.”

He’s trying to be funny. He’s laying it on thick to entertain me and something about this lifts my spirit. My impending death is no more than a funny joke to him. It helps take me out of my own misery, so I relent. I’m alive but I’m badly injured. What are my options? None. I can’t go anywhere with my busted ankle and this snow will kill me if I stay outside much longer. I know I should be scared of this man. He’s a stranger and I’m in a strange land. But I’m not scared. I’m indifferent. I’m tired, hungry, thirsty, and injured. If I die, I die. What’s it matter?

I let him boost me over his shaggy horse and set me into the saddle. He tugs-off his coat, drapes it over me, lowers the hood over my head, and tucks the skirt down my legs. I suppose if things were different, I’d find this very exciting. A tall handsome stranger on a dark horse coming to my rescue and saving me from certain death, but I’m too tired to care. He mounts behind me and spurs the horse into a lively gallop, its legs sunk to its cannons in the deep powdered snow.


	11. Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven

“Clouds on frost,” Barnhart says and fans the flames in a cast-iron wood stove, the dusky sweet smoke perfuming the cabin air. “Had that first killing frost last week and woke to that big freeze a couple days ago.”

Mounted on his big black horse, Barnhart had ferried me to Fort Calvary, a small settlement encircled by a thirty-foot wood post stockade sharpened into points. ‘Keeps the wolves at bay,’ he’d joked as we crossed the heavy front gates patrolled by sentries in flanking guard towers. The fort’s tucked in a narrow valley between steep mountains lined in tall straight evergreens.

We sit in the front partition of his two-room log cabin of cedar-planked floors. I’m in a hickory chair polished in age, tracked in ax marks, and draped in tanned horse hides. I keep my hands wrapped around an enamelware mug of honey-sweetened brew-up, but these hands don’t look anything like my hands—ugly, red, ice-burned, and swollen. I don’t know how I survived. I don’t know how I didn’t lose my hands or feet to frostbite. I owe Barnhart my life. I suppose luck was on my side but I don’t feel very lucky. I suppose it’s because I know my injured ankle will greatly limit my movement, which makes me feel so far away from Joel.

I rest my mug on the large lumber table, which he clearly uses as a kitchen table, a work bench, and a desk. It’s lit by a flickering oil lantern with a tin reflector. Someone made this for him. A wife or a girlfriend. It’s too feminine to be worked by someone with his hands and demeanor. He gets up and goes behind a wooden partition dividing the cabin in half. I suppose he sleeps back there because there’s no bed here in the front. I gather his coat draped over my shoulders and raise the lapel high against my neck, reeked in his patchouli. This smell suits him. I suppose everyone out here smells like this. You can’t imagine them smelling any other way. I pull my knees to my chest and tuck my legs beneath the oversized wool sweater he let me wear after I shed my iced-over clothes on the floor. I also wear a pair of his big raccoon-fur slippers. I’ve never met a man who owned a pair of slippers. I suppose he enjoys his comforts.

He comes back to the table with a large tin box and sets it down. There must be something precious in there. Tobacco or medicine. Tin keeps out the vermin. “The first snowfall never comes cheerfully, yeah?” he says. “One minute it ain’t yet winter and the next, you can’t see your own hands through the snow. Most’ll crow about the cold but it kills all ’em critters—lice, fleas, bedbugs, flies, mosquitoes, chiggers.” He sets a steaming stock pot on the table and drags-up his chair till it’s right up against mine, facing me. “Snow silences everything pure,” he says. “It’s like an open book of footprints, as readable as words, plainly recorded for everyone to see. It’s how I found you.”

“What were you doing out there?” I ask.

“Tracking a wily red fox over hill and dale,” he says with a wry smile.

“In a blizzard?”

“Snow’s the best concealment. Wind drives away my scent and the snow hides the smell of my tracks. I trail better than I hunt. I can track by breath alone. My prey’s foot doesn’t even need to have touched the ground.” He turns the wick higher on the lantern, flooding the table with light. “Let’s see that foot,” he says and pats his lap. I draw my bare legs from beneath my sweater and lay them across his lap. I do this delicately because I’m naked beneath his sweater. I had no choice—my clothes were soaking wet. He opens-up the tin, and takes-out a dried corn husk and a stout tobacco plug. He tears off a piece with his teeth, shreds it into a husk, rolls it tight, and lights it against the neck of the lantern. He straightens, squinting against the smoke. His eyes are small and close set. His hair’s the color of rope and he wears it in a baggy topknot. His beard’s short with groomed stubble. “So tell me,” he says. “How’d a nice girl like you run into this dead and buried backwoods?”

“I was ambushed,” I say.

“Who did the ambushing?”

“I don’t know. It was dark.”

“Where are your folks?” he asks.

“I have none.”

“What do you mean you have none? Everyone has folks.”

“They’re dead.”

“Didn’t seem to be in much of a hurry, calculating by ’em tracks.”

“Which tracks?”

“Yours.”

“There were others?” I ask and my heart skips a beat. Was I followed? Did the ambushers stalk me? Did Lith get out alive and come after me? “Just yours,” he says. “Mostly buried. But I could still feel ’em under my feet—shallow, shuffled, and panicked—circled around and around like a hen with its head cut off. I knew your ankle was busted or I calculated you were blind drunk. How’d you hurt it?” I think about this for a moment. Even if I were to tell him the truth, where would I start, so I say, “It got caught in a rabbit hole.”

“A rabbit hole, huh?” he asks and his tone of voice tells me he doesn't believe me, so I keep my face blank and repeat, “A rabbit hole.” 

“Are you a wife to somebody?” he asks.

“No.”

“I’m looking for a wife.”

“Keep looking,” I say with a laugh and he laughs with me, and asks, “Got childs?” 

“No. You?”

“What are you aiming to do here?”

“Rest my ankle, I guess. What do you do here?”

“I just laze around all day,” he says with a laugh. “I’m what you call a jack of all trades and a master of none. Where are you from?”

“Salt Lake City,” I say, figuring someone as rural as him has never been outside his own territory. “Ain’t that something?” he asks, his face lighting-up in excitement. “Which hood?”

“Central,” I say.

“Central City?” he asks and I nod my head, yes, doubling-down on the lie. I figure every QZ has a central neighborhood. He laughs, deep from his chest, and asks, “Which quad? Which block?” Before I can cue-up another lie, he continues, “Wait! Don’t tell me! I like a good mystery. If you told me, there’d be no fun in it. Now I can make-up my own stories about it. Isn’t that better? The best stories always have some mystery to ’em.” He rolls back his flannel shirtsleeves to thick indigo bands tattooing his muscular forearms. These tattoos don’t look like any I’ve ever seen before—no symbols, signs, or words. Just bars. His body hair’s thick, curly, and coarse like a fluffy sheep and I find this endearing. “Deported from Herriman myself. Ever been?”

“No,” I answer.

“Course not.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning fate has a funny way of shuffling us all into the right places, don’t you think?”

“I don’t believe in fate.”

“I suppose it doesn’t matter if you believe in it or not. It’s a fact. Fate’s running this game and the game’s gotta be played till the end. I ain’t saying all the cards have been played but I’ve gotta pretty good hand.”

“You don’t need a good hand to win,” I say. “It depends on who’s holding them.”

He laughs and says, “Not if you’ve gotta pack of dirty deuces up your sleeve. Though sometimes folks’ll have a little bit of luck and press it too far. I’ve seen it happen plenty of times. They don’t know when to lay down a hand.” He takes a drag from his cigarette and gestures vaguely behind his head. “I was born and raised up in these here mountains till I struck out on my own, wanted to learn the ways of the world in the big city. Didn’t get much learning done. A month later—the Surrender. Three militiamen showed-up at my door at dawn. Couldn’t take nothing, just the clothes on my back. We were rounded-up and shucked into big yellow school buses. Those who weren’t taken looked down from their windows—said nothing, did nothing, aimed on taking no chances—watched us being led like lambs to slaughter, like watching a movie on a big screen. I got out quick. I was never one for the grind and grime of the QZ. Crowded houses, urban temptations, book-learning lowlanders, squirrelly foreigners, coyote military men. Paying good money for government men to fill up your head with fancy notions. No, sir! Gain the world, lose your soul! These here woods breed individuality and personality in its highest form. Room to breathe, grow, hunt, and wander at will. We’re independent and self-reliant, raising sons and daughters with eagles’ hearts and minds. In the QZs, y’all share the same ideas, wear the same clothes, and eat off the same menus. Out here, no two men have the same notion about nothing. We’re ragged, dirty, unshaven…and happy.”

I don’t believe him. I’ve lived in the QZ and the hinterlands, and I’ll bet everyone out here thinks and acts exactly like him. “So how’d you end up there?” he asks. “Deported,” I answer and he squints at me hard, and asks, “How old are you?”

“How old do I look?” I ask.

“Awful young.”

“I’m nineteen.” 

“You sure don’t look it.”

“You’re very big,” I say, changing the subject. “How old are you?”

“North of thirty, south of forty,” he says and starts feeling-up my legs, touching them like we’re a couple and this is what we do every night over steaming brew-up in front of the fire. He reaches into my slippers and pushes them off my feet, and they thud onto the floor. This makes me nervous—being barefoot. The only time I’m barefoot is if I’m in bed or bathing, and this is neither. He must sense my trepidation because he says, “I ain’t gonna hurt you none, yeah?” He’s very perceptive. He was born a rural redneck and his accent makes him sound like an idiot but he’s very perceptive.

He pulls out a thick steaming snakeskin from the stockpot and drapes it over the top of my injured foot. I gasp at the sensation of it on my skin—hot, thick, slimy, and wet. “Big timber rattler,” he says. “Trapped in the dog days of summer, half-blind, soaked in salt ‘n’ vinegar. Good for what ails you.” He wraps it around my ankle and overwraps it with a tanned leather strip. His hands are unhardened by manual labor, and his cuticles are neat and clean. He’s got the habits of a mountain man acquired over the lifetime of tough work but he’s not a manual worker. He may have been at one time but he’s not anymore. I can figure-out this much about him. His shoulders move with a steady graceful swing, and he holds his strong body loose and lithe. His manner is humorous, bold, and reckless, which comes from the constant threat of facing danger. “You had a long tough fight out there,” he says, “but there’s two things you need before you sleep: food and drink. I’mma wrangle up some vittles.” He pulls to his feet and rummages a large armoire stuffed with dry goods, linens, and housewares. “I calculate it doesn’t take much to keep you going.”

“Don’t go through any trouble for me,” I tell him.

“I’ve always got provisions for whoever comes my way. A duty to drifters of every kind in the spirit of fellowship and goodwill. I’d give half my kingdom even if I was down to my last grain of barley. If a man ain’t sure when he might have to beg, he’s mighty careful to refuse his neighbor.” He sets down a thick glass bottle of amber liquor, tin tumblers, flatbread, and a small sausage on an oak board. “Last year was mighty tough on the crops. Winter came hard with a deep freeze and deep snow. Spring was dry and mild but then came the grasshoppers. Every blade of grass and green thing got swarmed—covered the fields like a living breathing sea. Couldn’t even open the door without hundreds flying in. Looked like the ten plagues of Pharaoh! They ate-up everything. Left nothing but a couple tiny potatoes.” He cuts the sausage and offers me a piece. “We raise beef critters out yonder but them’s for milking. Ain’t much on short notice but tomorrow’ll be different.” He splashes liquor into a tin tumbler and throws back a shot. “Lucky you didn’t lose any fingers or toes out there,” he says and starts to feel-up my foot. I like the way his hands feel on my foot. I don’t understand why I should like this so much but I do. “You’re one of ’em lucky ones,” he says.

“Luckier than who?” I ask.

“All ’em strong brave men lured by that irresistible snow slumber, sleeping in death when we find ’em at spring’s first thaw. Some make it to the gates—half-starved, half-dead, half-blind—clothes frozen hard as iron, rattling like boards. Had a QZ fellow up here just last week, came up over ’em western hills pretty near dead. Didn’t have a single stitch on him, clothes hanging-off by a thread. He ate ten kokanees for dinner like a pig at a trough. Looked like a gull with fish tails coming back up outta his beak! He sawed-off the heads, stacked ’em on his plate, and asked me to save ’em for breakfast.” He laughs and shakes his head, no. “I done buried him before sun-up.”

“He ate himself to death?” I ask and he nods his head, yes. “Why didn’t you stop him?” I ask.

“When a man’s playing his own hand and he’s stacked the cards against himself, I reckon that’s his own business. The Surrender’s thrown-open the wilderness to all kinds of folks. QZ fellows fan-out to this here country, find it bigger than they calculated, and get tangled-up in the big woods.”

I glance around the cabin. It’s clear he’s a man of the mountains. The walls are decorated in his trophies but despite his trophies and fancy guns, I can tell he’s not a sure-shot nor a competent gunfighter by the way he moves and his slow-witted intellect. I suppose all the men out here feel like they have to fight, and protect themselves and their families against something—the animals, the weather, the mountains. They’re always poor and starving. It’s a hard life. You can always see it in their faces and I can see it in his.


	12. Chapter Twelve

Chapter Twelve

A shrill wind hisses past the cabin’s walls. Icy snowdrifts drive against the windows and prickle the glass. “Found you just in time,” Barnhart says. “But I wish it was sooner.” He massages my foot, lacing his fingers through my toes and I wriggle a bit in my chair. His hands feel very nice. Why this is, I have no idea. “When you were out there all alone, what’d you wish for?” he asks and I don't respond. Like I’ve said before, I don’t believe in wishes. “Wishes,” he repeats. “Wants, desires, dreams.”

“I don’t believe in wishes.”

“Why not?”

“Why would I wish for something I know’ll never come true?”

“What do you believe in?” he asks. I think about this for a moment and say, “Will.”

“Reckon you’re strong-willed?”

“Yeah.”

“What you desire, you have?” His eyes soften and melt. I know that look. I know what’s coming and I don’t do anything to stop it because I want it, too. “Mine’s like iron,” he says. He takes my face into his hand and pulls me close till our foreheads touch. He pushes his nose along mine. His breath comes quick. I meet his lips and we kiss, gasping softly into each other's mouths. His tongue tastes like whisky and tobacco. His lips taste like the salt of the sausage he just ate. He digs into my hair and sighs into my mouth. I feel something between us. I could fall in love with a man like this. He’s good-looking, he’s clean, and he’s all man but his skin’s soft. 

He breaks from my lips and searches my face, and says, “Reckon it’s time for bed.” He lifts me from my chair and cradles me to his chest like a child. I entwine my arms around his neck. He looks down at me and smiles warmly. It's a nice look, this look on his face. He carries me past the divider into a large room. There’s not much in here aside from a large four-post bedstead bored into the wall and a large flagstone chimney of dying embers. Wind howls and drives icy gusts down the chimney, scattering embers across the hearth. He sets me on his bed laid with a shaggy bison pelt. The bison’s massive mounted head overhangs the headboard, a great web of hair draping its neck. Such a peculiar thing to put over a bed. Why would you put something like this over a bed? Every time you look up, you see this poor beast’s head, his expression frozen in death.

He goes over to the chimney and rakes-up the embers. He tosses long burn logs into the firebox, pulls the andirons together on the hearth, and lays the shovel and poker horizontally across it. He’s very meticulous about this and I respect it. He comes over to the bed and starts tugging at my sweater. I let him pull it off me. He gets me naked and takes-in my whole body—my twat, my belly, my breasts—and his eyes soften. He likes what he sees. He sits himself down on the edge of the mattress and starts to undress. He smiles faintly to himself as he does this like he's recalling a nice little joke. He’s in no rush. This makes me feel like maybe he doesn’t want to fuck. Maybe he just wants to sleep with a warm naked woman at his side. I can’t figure him out.

He takes off his jeans and he’s got the same indigo bands on his forelegs as his arms. I look at his cock. I have to do this. Anyone in my position would. He’s a big man with a deep broad chest, so I figure he’s got a cock to match, but it’s the smallest one I’ve ever seen. Wilted, is the first word I think of when I look at it. I could have a mousetrap for a twat and he’d still fit it in, no problem. He sees me looking and I suppose the look on my face doesn’t reflect what he was expecting to see because he smiles and says, “Don’t worry, sweet pea. I’m a grower.”

He lays down on the bed and stretches out on his side. I stretch-out on my side facing him and he pulls me close till we’re intertwined. He slips a knee between mine and holds me by my hip. “Sarah,” he says. Stop. I know what this sounds like—choosing the name Sarah out of all the possible names in the world—but hear me out. Sarah was the first name that rolled-off my tongue when he asked me what my name was. I was detached from this world, half-frozen in snow. Sarah’s a strong name. Short and familiar, and easy to remember. It’s as good a name as any other.

He wraps me in his arms and rolls onto his back, taking me with him. I lay over him and feel the full length of him stretched-out beneath me. He’s breathing heavy like he’s been running from a bear but his muscles are big and strong so I know he wants to fuck. I want to fuck, too. We rub our bellies and chests together, slowly fucking against each other and making little pleased sounds. I picture him pulling apart my legs and squeezing himself between them, and something comes over me. This feeling comes out of nowhere. I feel naked and vulnerable with a total stranger. I feel lost, small, and lonely, like I’ve been placed in this room with a complete stranger. What do I know about him? Nothing—except he has a black horse and he’s bagged a lot of big game to decorate his walls. I think he’s handsome and I like the look of him—his ease, his warmth, and his humor—but I know nothing about him. My muscles draw-in on themselves and he must sense my trepidation because he asks, “Are you afraid of me?”

“No,” I say, knowing my reply was too hasty and my tone was too clipped to be convincing. He asks, “Are you sorry you came here with me?” and I've got no answer for him. Would I rather still be asleep in the snow, dead from hypothermia? I can’t answer that. I realize the fact I’m thinking about these things means I’m not into him the way I should be. I shouldn’t be thinking of these things right now. I should be overcome with the feeling of wanting to fuck him, wanting to feel him closer and nearer, but I feel alone, scared, and homesick for familiar things that are long gone. “Are we safe?” I ask, my voice coming out higher and tighter than I wanted.

“We’re safe,” he says and holds me tighter.

“Tell me again.”

“We’re safe.”

“Don’t stop.”

“We’re safe, we’re safe, we’re safe.” He pushes-back the hair from my forehead. “Them gates are high and strong. I won’t let no danger come near you. I ain’t gonna let no one hurt you. I'll never let you go.” He pushes his nose along mine and we kiss, sighing into each other’s mouths. I take his cock into my hand and squeeze my fingers around it. He gasps in a way that makes me think I squeezed too hard or my hand’s too cold. He doesn’t have the type of erection he ought to have so I slip between his legs and suck on it a bit till he has something good enough to fuck me with.

He leads me onto my back and climbs between my legs. He takes his cock in his hand, rubs it against my split, and slips it right in. No teasing, no tickling, no talking dirty. He hasn’t opened me up with his fingers nor his mouth but it doesn’t feel the slightest bit tight when he pushes himself into me. He just pushes himself in and starts to slowly fuck me. He’s not very big and I’m very wet so it slips out a couple times. Just a cock and a twat, slipping and grinding, flesh pounding flesh, meat pounding meat. I could care less if he stopped right now or if he went on forever. ‘Are you finished? Is it over? Are you done?’ I picture myself saying with complete disinterest after he blows his load. All I can think about is how much better it’d be if it were Tommy fucking me. Or Joel. Dear, God, if it were Joel. Everything anybody does to me would be better if it were Tommy or Joel. I wonder if it’s because of their big cocks. I think about their big cocks and how they make me feel so wonderful. It’s all I can think about as Barnhart lays into me.

He’s not in me much longer till I can tell he’s going to come. Soon enough, he pulls himself out and fucks himself into his hand till he comes on my belly. His come pours all over me and I don’t particularly care much about it. When he’s done coming, he rolls off me and lays on his back, catching his breath. He hasn’t made me come. He doesn’t ask and he doesn’t care. He fishes around the bedside dresser and wipes his come from my belly onto something soft like a t-shirt. He drags-up the bison pelt with his feet and tucks it over my shoulders. He twines himself against me and kisses me all over. “Did you come?” he asks.

“I’m not very experienced,” I say, being evasive.

“You don’t gotta be. You just gotta feel it. Did you feel it?”

“I’m not sure how I’d know.”

“You’d know. I was hoping you’d know.”

“I haven’t been with a lotta men.”

“That doesn’t matter. You’d know.”

“It must be hard to know then.”

“You’d know,” he says and we drift off to sleep.

I wake overnight with my head resting on his arm and our legs intertwined. Through the half-frosted window panes, a full moon slips past silvery clouds. The snow’s stopped and the wind’s calmed. I feel safe but I know it won’t last long. The Fireflies will come for me. They’ll come looking for me when they realize we didn’t make it to the next checkpoint. I can’t stay long. They’ll come after me, and when they find me, they’ll take me back to Salt Lake City and kill me. They’ll find settlements like this and show them my bounty. I’m sure of this. The bad weather will limit their movements but once the ground firms up, they'll come.

What’s the point of running and hiding, I think to myself. I don’t want to be hunted like a fox, dragged out of the forest before I’m tortured and killed. I don’t want to live my life being hunted. The Fireflies will always find me. They have the manpower and the resources to hunt me down. They’re smarter and stronger than I am. If I want to live, I’d have to live like a scared rabbit for the rest of my life, running from my own shadow. Who wants to be a rabbit? Nervous and suspicious, and always on the run.

I realize something right now. No matter what, I have to go back to the Rock for Joel. I have to go back for him. There’s no other choice. I'll figure it all out once I get there. I’ll go to the Fireflies. I’ll find Joel and I’ll see him one last time. Or I’ll trade my life for his. A life for a life. I make the decision and I’m resolute. I smile to myself. It’s the first time in a long time I remember feeling so determined.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen

I watch Barnhart from the bed as he dresses in front of an iced-over window washed blue-grey in pre-dawn light. He glances at me and says, “Damn if you ain’t the prettiest girl I’ve ever done seen.” I smile shyly and drop my eyes. “Reckon you need some feeding-up,” he says and I ask, “When’ll you be back?” “Immediately,” he says and grabs his shotgun from the chimney mantle. “That’s a beautiful piece,” I say, meaning the gun’s lavishly-engraved plates carved with trees, flowers, and wild game.

“I’m fond of ’em fancy doodles,” he says.

“Do you have an extra one for me?” I ask and he laughs like it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard. “There ain’t even enough guns for the menfolk!” He kisses the tip of my nose. “Rest that ankle, sweet pea. You’re somewhat run down. I reckon you’ve got a bit of snow blindness.” He’s right. I rub them with the backs of my knuckles, and they feel watery and raw. “Don’t you go nowhere, yeah?” he says. “If anything happened to you, I’d never forgive myself.”

“What’s gonna happen to me?”

“Nothing. As long as you stay put. Sentry lets no one through without permission and I ain’t giving it to you. Not with that busted ankle. You oughta be comfortable here. The roof leaks and the wind comes through the cracks. It ain’t luxurious but I call it home. This place is yours.” He grabs a camo field jacket from a wall peg. As he finishes gearing-up in the front partition, I snuggle into his hay-stuffed pillows and mattress, the sheets soured with his patchouli-musk where I sleep soundly till I’m woken-up hours later by the rattling of the iron-door latch. Heavy footfalls stamp around the front partition and a moment later, Barnhart comes to the bedside, tracking muddy slush all over the floor. “Did you miss me?” he asks. Before I can answer, he takes my face in his freezing-cold hands and kisses me with icy lips. I yelp and playfully push him away. I’m overcome by a new feeling of fondness toward him. He seems untroubled by everything and it lightens my heart. “I hope you’re peasant-hungry!” he says, tosses his field jacket onto the bed, and goes into the front room.

I pull his big wool sweater from a wall peg, step into his raccoon slippers, and shuffle to the front partition. My ankle’s very swollen. It’ll take weeks to properly heal and this troubles me. I find him drinking lustily from an aluminum dipper dunked into a water bucket. On the table are two large birch rolls shaved from branches with their ends plugged with moss. The bagged pheasants must be in there, is what I’m thinking, which is such a beautiful way to transport small game. He fills the wood stove firebox and sparks a fire with a steel striker, the embers popping briskly. He sits at the table and pats his thigh. “Come’re,” he says and I climb into his lap. He draws-up my arms and laces them around his neck, sighing contentedly. “What’d you do all day?”

“Rested my ankle,” I say.

“Is that why the hearth ain’t swept, the bed ain’t made, and the dishes ain’t washed?” I don’t respond, trying to figure out if he’s being serious or joking. “Even if you had the money,” he continues, “yours would be of no value here.”

“Meaning?” I ask.

“Meaning there’s a medium of exchange,” he says and gestures at the birch game bags. “Labor. I’mma teach you how to pluck pheasant. Under a man’s guidance.”

“I know how to pluck them. And field dress them. And hunt ’em in a blind.”

“Know how to cook them up?” he asks and I nod my head, yes. He squeezes my thigh and touches up my legs, and says, “Ain’t you the perfect woman? Beautiful, smart, and tough. You’ll make a good wife for a lucky man. Affectionate, obedient, gentle, and cheerful.”

I’m literally none of those things so I tell him this. “You don’t know me very well.”

“I know enough.” He takes my hand and kisses the back of it. “You’re pretty enough to make any man forget what doesn’t please him. He’ll break that spirit even if he has to break that pretty little head of yours along with it.”

“Not if I break his first.”

He laughs freely at this and says, “Women are queer critters. As long as there’s men left in the world to take care of ’em, they don’t gotta be tough like you. Figure on playing the field your whole life?”

“A man to order me around? To use me as he pleases?”

“You wouldn’t have a single care in the world with me in charge. I’d never let the fire or game trail grow cold. All you gotta do is cook my kill, keep the house clean, raise my kids sturdy and strong, listen to my heartache, and make me happy.”

“I’ll do those things for someone because I want to, not because I have to.”

He laughs at this and says, “You and me? We belong together.” He takes my face in his hand and comes in for a kiss.

–––––––

I wake the next morning to the steady methodical tempo of wood chopping beyond the cabin walls. At regular intervals, a grindstone whirls and sharpens a blade, and the pitch augments as water sluices the stone. This sound is very annoying. No one could sleep through this so I get up.

Barnhart’s not here. He left at daybreak and said he’d be back by nightfall. The cabin looks different in the daylight—a beautiful disorder. Powdery grey ash coats the furniture in a thick sooty pall. Large dusty footprints stamp the floors. The back corner’s piled with fishing rods, nets, snowshoes, skis, canoe paddles, and boots. Dehydrated red pepper garlands hang from wall-mounted elk antlers and oil bracket lamps. Mesh bags of onions drape the rafters. I poke around the shelves and armoires, and find no books, not even a Bible. He doesn’t like to read, he can’t read, or he doesn’t have time to read. Regardless, I don’t care for it in a man. A man should know how to read and he should want to read even if it’s just the Bible.

I rake-up the wood stove ashes, toss in a log, stoke a steel-striker fire, and brew-up last night’s tea. I try to put on my boots but it’s impossible. My injured ankle’s way too swollen to fit into my own. I try one of his and it fits just right so I wear one of his and one of mine. I pull on my anorak, and unlatch the front door to brilliant sun and deep blue skies. Fort Calvary gleams, blanketed in sparkling radiant snow. A light breeze of crisp mountain air scatters frost from the trees.

Identical log cabins run seven rows wide and ten rows deep, set on a rectangular grid of wooden boardwalks. Barnhart’s cabin is centered along the first row, overlooking a large rectangular courtyard abutting the front gates. A prime location. He must be someone important. The premium location and the fact he lives alone tells me this. I don’t know why this is, though, because he seems too dim-witted and untroubled to be anyone important. 

At the center of the courtyard is a large log cabin meetinghouse of rough-squared pine timbers chinked with slanted chips. An immense ancient elm overhangs it, its boughs heavy with snow. A dozen women mill a slushy patch framed by great cypress logs, a flagstone chimney, a stone well, and a water pump. The logs are heaped with washboards, iron kettles, and piles of dingy linen. This must be where they do their laundry and gossip. Soon enough, they notice me. They grow silent and track me with anxious eyes, sullen and suspicious. The meetinghouse doors swing open, and a huge group of mixed-aged children stream out. Their faces are unwashed and crusted in mud, and their long hair’s rough and webby. These are exactly the kinds of people I’d expect to see living out here.

I head toward the fort rear, passing the rows of cabins. Smoke skeins wisp every chimney. Wild-looking bearded men stand on ladders and clear snow from roofs. Women sweep dirt through open front doors with brooms of bundled sedge grass. Inside, multiple generations of families huddle around glowing wood stoves. Walls are hung with large trophy hides and pelts. Shelving’s piled with iron pots, oil lamps, buckets, and linens. Where do they all sleep, is what I’m wondering.

The air at the back gates smells very bad. Open gutters dug along the boardwalks drain back here. There’s a crumbling barn of sullen cows, rudimentary horse stables, a crooked pig-pen with muddy hogs, and a dilapidated chicken coop. I can smell the fresh shit of the livestock even through the snow. There’s a large pine gazebo with ash hoppers, lye soap barrels, and a crude cider press. Roving packs of dogs dig and sniff at everything. Fort Calvary’s homesteaders are rough, poor, weary, indifferent, and unrefined. They live in grim monotony, value little, know nothing beyond their borders, and don’t care for outsiders like me.

With my ankle throbbing pain, I head back to Barnhart’s cabin to rest. As I pass a corner cabin, the front door swings open to a tall fair woman of indeterminate age, I suppose in her twenties or thirties. She empties a full bedpan into a canal and looks at me with red-rimmed eyes. Two sturdy blond preschooler boys with dirt-smudged cheeks chase each other around the cabin yard. They must be her kids because they look just like her. “Hey!” she yells at me. “Are you Sarah?”

“Why?” I ask.

“I’d like to talk to you.”

“Go right ahead.”

“I’m wanting to show you something,” she says and gestures toward her cabin. “I’ll stay out here,” I tell her.

“If you ain’t serious-minded, no use helping you,” she says and I think about this. I don’t like the idea of turning down an offer of help, so I say, “If I come in, I can’t stay long.” “I didn’t ask you to stay long,” she says and I follow her inside. The layout’s the same as Barnhart’s with front and back rooms partitioned over wide-slat hewn floors. A large oil lantern hangs from the heavy ceiling beams, black with soot. The kitchen table’s a repurposed chicken coop topped with a large wooden slab. A dozen grey and gold Dutch Bantams stick their beaks through the slats. Pin feathers, broken straw, and seeds strew the floor. I perch a rough-hewn lumber chair at the table and ask her, “What should I call you?”

“Rabbit.” She squints at me. “I’ve seen you before.”

“Where?” I ask.

“I knew you were coming, knew I’d be fetching-up company. Hens be fighting something fierce.” She gestures at a wrinkled woman with a bright scarlet shawl in a rocking chair aside the stove. “That’s Granny Lady,” she says. “You got any female complaints, let her know. I sure as hell don’t want no menfolk conjuring around my parts.” She ties an apron over her long dark skirt, pulls a steel tomahawk and an onion from a cabinet, and starts chopping it into large wedges. “So let’s have it,” she says. “Are you a government fellow, like him?”

“A what?” I ask.

“A government fellow like him.”

“A government fellow like who?”

“Like who?” she laughs mockingly. “That damned fool you conjured!” I suppose she means Barnhart but I can barely understand a thing she’s saying. “Well?” she continues. “Own up! Did you meet him sheriffing?”

“Do you mean Barnhart?”

“Pappy of ’em bastard young’uns.” She glances toward the front door echoed with the shrieking boys. “Law ‘n’ Order. Them pappy’s Fort Calvary’s deputy sheriff.” My lips part to speak and my blood chills. Sheriff? Did she say, sheriff? This is no good. No good will come of this. If Barnhart’s connected to the law, surely he’ll know who I am, and if he doesn’t know yet, word will come. The bad weather will delay the messages for now, but once the sun dries-out the paths, word will come quick. I realize right now I need to leave this place. Tonight if possible. Goddamn my injured ankle! I won’t be able to travel far nor hard. It’ll be very slow going but I can’t wait around till it heals and risk Barnhart discovering my bounty. My bounty. My upper lip breaks-out in cold sweat. Oh, God. Maybe he already knows who I am. My pulse beats my mouth dry. No. No, it’s impossible. If he knew, wouldn’t he have already notified the Fireflies? Wouldn’t he have handcuffed me and taken me to them already? Locked me up somewhere for safekeeping? It doesn’t make any sense. I’ve been here for two days, roaming free as I please. Besides, he’s an idiot. I looked through his stuff. I didn’t find one book in the entire place, not even a Bible! He’s dumb and rural. Maybe Rabbit’s lying. I mean, look at her. She’s a lunatic, chopping onions into wedges and leaving them all over her furniture with her big red hands, wrinkled like an old woman’s.

“That boy went wrong,” she says to the room. “Ain’t worth a good goddamn. Always raising hell and talking to the Devil. Tomcatting. Between us old maids, he’s got five young’uns and two more on the way. Plus a dozen more spirited away to Spookland. You’ve conjured him good but he’s gonna trifle with you. I can promise you that.”

“Are you his wife?” I ask, and she laughs disdainfully and says, “Haven’t been blessed with that pleasure. I’m a house mother.”

“What’s a house mother?”

“We take care of the house and the young’uns. We clean, sew, cook, and do the laundry. Pick and preserve the fruits and vegetables. Raise the gardens. Wash, card, spin, and weave the wool. Mend and make the clothes, and the blankets. Soap, butter, and lard. We dress and prepare the meat. Hog and fowl. We raise the poultry and milk the cows.”

“Is that all?” I ask sarcastically. “Go on!” she says with a cruel laugh, “Ask Barnhart to grab an apron and help you with the chores!”

“So what do the men do?” I ask.

“Hunt and bring the wood.”

“Isn’t that unfair? Everyone living under the same roof should have the same responsibilities.”

“Men don’t live in houses!” she yells. “They come home to eat and sleep. Their lives are out there. Out in ’em woods, off on adventures. Hunting, fishing, gambling, and drinking. It’s our job to preserve the traditions and make sacrifices—first to him, then to his kin. A woman comes into a man’s life to cook his meals, take care of his house, and raise his kin—at any hour.”

“That’s oppressive,” I say.

“Oh, Lordy!” she says with a laugh. “You’re one of ’em queer militant women, ain’t you? Huffing and puffing about your damn rights! There’s nothing wrong with taking care of your home, your husband, and your kin. It should fill you with pride. Get your priorities straight!”

“You should live how you wanna live,” I say. “Be free to choose whatever you wanna do with your life. A man doesn’t hold your value.”

She laughs at me and says, “So you wanna leave the comforts of your home, and go hunting and stalking out in ’em cold dark woods? Chop wood? Dig ditches? Bend steel? What kinda woman wants to do that? Not one in her right mind, that’s for sure!”

“It’s inferior,” I say.

“You just want it all, yeah?”

“Why not?”

“Well you can’t have it! Stop your bellyaching. Man works hard to care for his wife and kin. And a woman finds happiness in how well she can take care of him and his kin at all hours of the day and night. I saw you looking at my hands. Well, I’m proud of these hands! These hands bear a lifetime of hard work.”

“It doesn’t have to be like that,” I say.

“You’re a sad case!”

“Don’t you ever get tired of always doing what’s expected of you?” I ask and she looks at me directly, her eyes narrowed into blazing slits. “Tell me, Sarah,” she says. “Who do you think cleans Barnhart’s outhouse?”

“How should I know?” I ask. 

“Well go try it yourself. Maybe it’ll make you feel more _liberated_.”


	14. Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fourteen

I find Barnhart back in his cabin, sitting at the front table, smoking a cigarette. “Evening, sweet pea,” he says in greeting and even the sound of his voice makes the back of my neck flush warm in anger. I look at him and all I see is evasiveness and lies. He asked me everything but told me nothing. “Something’s the matter?” he asks and I say, “You should know.” “Well,” he says, his voice drawled, “I’ve never been good with riddles.”

“Why didn’t you tell me you were the deputy sheriff?” I ask.

“I never told you I wasn’t.” He takes a long drag from his cigarette and extinguishes it between his fingers. “Who’ve you been chatting-up?”

“Rabbit,” I say and he groans. “Damn it!” he yells. “Don’t listen to them crowed-up lies! She farted out ’em twins and swears they’re mine! Don’t believe a damn word she says!”

“Why weren’t you straight with me?”

“I ain’t a mind-reader! You never asked me about ’em things!”

“You lied!”

“Noble lies. The saints told 'em—believed they paved the path to Heaven.”

“A liar’s a liar no matter what he lies about,” I say.

“Stop calling me that! I was just careless in handling the truth.” He sighs deep and runs a hand through his hair. “I didn’t mean no harm. I just wanted you to like me for who I was, not for no fancy sheriffing title.” I need a moment to think about all of this and how the hell I’m going to get out of here. I’d prefer to leave tonight. It’ll be slow-going but I’ll take my chances. I have to break it to him as soon as possible because of the sentries at the front gates. Will he give them orders to let me pass? I suppose I could disguise myself as one of the townspeople. No. The guards would know. It’s their job to know. I’ll figure something out, but in the meantime, I have to get him used to the idea I’m leaving, so I say, “I need to find my group.”

“You won’t get far with that ankle,” he says.

“My ankle’s fine.”

“That limp says otherwise!”

“It’s fine.”

“Where’re you fixing on going?”

“Back the way I came.”

“You’ve got no business roving alone. You need an escort. I know those trails like the back of my hand.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“I won’t permit a girl to travel alone in that there wild country. You need protection.”

“I’ll ask if I need help.”

“You ain’t that type,” he says.

“What type?” I ask.

“Headstrong and assertive. If you weren’t a woman, I’d make you my agent of justice. Pin a marshal’s star on you.”

“Why can’t a woman be an agent of justice?”

“Folks can’t shoot a woman!” he says and laughs like it’s the dumbest thing in the world. “Is that why you have this whole place to yourself?” I ask, meaning his cabin. “Sheriffing?”

“It ain’t as glamorous as it sounds. No guns, no ammo. Mangy horses, all hard keepers. Half the town’s feeble-minded and lazy. Convicts, criminals, and drunks. Shiftless low-country folks living hand to mouth. Everyone’s related to some degree by blood. They’ve been married up, down, left, right, upside-down and sideways till everyone’s his own grandparent, breeding till the whole generation’s run down. There’s a whole lotta in-laws feuding and killing each other. Intermarriage makes it worse—and corn whisky.”

“So why’d you take the job?” I ask.

“Reckon someone had to do it.”

“Weren’t there others?”

“Plenty. But most of them were either trigger happy or bottle happy.”

“Does it pay well?” I ask and he laughs raucously. “Not a damn thing,” he says. “I’m damned lucky if I ain’t shot to death every day.”

“What kind of policing do you do?”

“Plain murder, robbery under arms, intimidation of justice. Banditry and horse thieves. Rustlers rustling our stock. Can’t get a line on who’s been doing it.”

“What’s the punishment?”

“Rustling?” he asks and I nod my head, yes. “Cut off a hand,” he continues. “Poke out an eye, slice off an ear.”

“Really?” I ask.

“Nah. A hundred lashes. Or hanged from a tree till they’re dead.”

“Is that the elm over the meetinghouse?”

“That’s the hanging tree.”

“Ever hanged anyone?”

“I swung a man not long ago.”

“There’s no executioner?” I ask.

“You’re looking at him. Judge, jury, and executioner. Killing under the protection of the law doesn’t take a whole lotta nerve.”

“No court? No fair trial?”

“It ain’t the way. Mob law.”

“No jurors?” I ask. 

“Wouldn’t be regular. I reckon no punishment’s kind. One man’s life’s as good as another and his gun’s the law. We’ve got a vigilance committee and a justice of peace, but he ain’t peaceing or justiceing none.”

“Your boss?” I ask and he answers, “My boss.” 

“Who is he?”

“A bad man with a gun. Blows hard and talks big but I calculate there ain’t much to him in a fight.”

“Do you catch a lot of lawbreakers?” I ask and he says, “They’re mostly loyal but we’ve had some disreputable characters. We turn ’em loose and they’re free to strike out wherever they please. We give them three days’ worth of dog pemmican and salted pork, take away their guns, and make sure no one passes ’em any.”

“And if they come back?”

“If we see ’em, we kill ’em.”

“Condemned for life,” I say.

“Life ain’t long. We never see any of ’em again no how, and if we do, they’re already dead.”

“What about that guy you hanged?”

“Luke Pierce? He wasn’t even worth the rope he swung on. He should’ve died young but the good Lord didn’t want him and the Devil didn’t want him, either! Had a right pretty wife but she had a peculiar habit of walking-off with other folks’ stuff. They had a dozen kids, a sorry mess a couple like that brings into the world. All of ’em were named after the Bible—sounded like the Twelve Apostles when all of ’em were home! He killed the whole lot of ’em and set fire to his cabin. Lucky no gales were blowing that night or the fire would’ve swept this place clean. Folks started showing-up at breakfast for his noon hanging. He thought he was gonna be pardoned or rescued, never believed he was gonna hang, not even that morning. I said to him, ‘Luke, there ain’t nothing more I can do for you. Just confess. I’ll give you 100 lashes, no more, no less,’ and he goes, ‘You ain’t running me and the kinda law you’re representing ain’t running me, either!’ Right before I hanged him, he swore his death would be avenged by some of his buddies living up in a cave in these hills. Said they’re gonna come kill me in cold blood, raid the townsfolk, and wipe this place clean offa the map. He promised me the first bullet’s got my name on it."

“You’re a wanted man?” I ask.

“A criminal always hates an honest man,” he says and pulls to his feet. “Now as deputy sheriff of this settlement, I ain’t dodging my responsibilities. You ain’t hitting the breeze tonight. I’ll see you off tomorrow. When it’s light.”

“And if I don’t listen?” I ask.

“I’mma remind you.”

“Who’s gonna stop me?”

“All of us. When the cry of vengeance rises-up in this here fort, folks’ll posse-up, grab the rope, and clean-up without much regard to right or wrong. I’ve seen ’em overtake a fugitive in half-a-mile. There’s a thousand places to hide up in ’em mountains and we know every last one of ’em sheriff-dodging hole-ups. You could surrender and bargain for a trial but there’s no courts.”

“I’ll take my chances,” I say.

“With just ’em flimsy clothes on your back? It ain’t safe. I’ll find you a horse, get you some weapons, and set you off right. Tomorrow morning at daybreak you’ll ride but tonight you’re staying here with me. What do you say?” I think about this. My own horse. I could cover a lot of ground with my own horse and nurse my ankle. I could reach the Rock in a matter of days instead of weeks. I wouldn’t have to worry about sneaking past the sentry guards, either, because I’d ride away with Barnhart’s permission. The thought of my own horse is too enticing to turn down so I decide to take him at his word. “Promise?” I ask and he scoffs, non-committal, and says, “I never make promises on what I will or won’t do. You’ve just gotta trust me. Promise you won’t run off?”

“Only if you promise me a horse,” I say.

“Do I gotta tie you to a tree?”

“Don’t threaten me!” I yell.

“You’re a mighty stubborn girl.”

“You’re goddamn right.”

“It ain’t polite to curse.”

“I can think of worse things.”

“What are you getting at?”

“Lying’s pretty fucked-up.”

“Lying ain’t a sin. It’s just a bad habit—and it sure ain’t my worst.” He goes over to the wood stove, swings open the grill plate, tosses-in a log, and stares into the flames. “I wanna be gone by daybreak,” I say.

“I know when you wanna go,” he says and feeds tinder bits into the firebox. “I don’t wanna be late,” I say.

“I already told you,” he says. “Is it good enough or not?” He slams the grill shut and looks at me directly. “You oughtn’t leave.”

“Why not?”

“There’s trouble beyond these walls.”

“I’m game for trouble.”


	15. Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Fifteen

Pack! Pack! Pack! Pack! Pack! I wake from a deep sleep to the sound of gunshots, my heart gripped in terror. Semi-automatic fire cracks beyond the walls. Barnhart stirs beneath the blanket and a moment later his breath eases back into deep sleep. The glowing embers of the hearth have burned-down about six hours so it must be the last hour of darkness before dawn.

Clamorous fists pound on the front door followed by loud hurried calls of urgency. Barnhart curses and throws back the covers. “Who the hell’s that?” he yells to the room, his tongue sluggish in sleep. He pulls on his jeans, disappears into the front of the cabin, and I hear the front door swing open. “Well, for the love of God, boys!” he yells. “What’s the deal with rattling me at this hour?” “Horse thieves!” an urgent voice answers, accompanied by the labored breathing of large men. “How many?” Barnhart asks and someone answers, “Four to six. Waiting in the scrub. Killed Walsh and ’em two Mitchell boys, injured Rowley. Bullet through his shoulder, clean out the other side. Rode off with all ’em Quarters.”

“No time for talk!” he tells the men. “Guns and horses, boys! Tack up my black!” He slams the front door and rushes back into the bedroom, cursing. Bathed in the soft orange light from the hearth’s glowing embers, he stumbles around for his clothes and says, “Don’t you go nowhere, you hear me? Don’t you leave.”

“What happened?” I ask.

“There be horse thieves on the loose. Killed three men and injured another—scouts before turn-out. Stole four Quarters, third time since harvest. At this rate, we won’t have any left by hay’s first cut.” He sits on the edge of his bed and pulls on his boots. “You ain’t gonna listen to me, I suppose?” I open my mouth to speak and he continues, “This is important, Sarah. Wait here,” and he rushes from the cabin into the courtyard. Every bone in my body screams for me to leave. Leave now while you have the chance! With four horses raided from their paltry stock, Barnhart won’t be in any position to give me one like he promised and he won’t let me walk out of here, free as I please. I can’t ignore the voice in my gut. I get up, gear-up as fast as I can, sneak out of the cabin, and seek cover against the exterior wall of one of the neighboring houses. I look out onto the courtyard, and it's swarming with townsmen holding long guns and flaming torches. They speak to each other in deep low serious voices, uneasy and restless. The front gates are closed and overseen by the guards, so how the hell am I going to sneak past them? 

Beyond the fort walls, galloping hooves crescendo. Riders in approach! A moment later, the front gates open to Barnhart riding two-up with the injured scout. Behind him, a couple horses trail litters with dead men in tow and come to a halt in front of the meetinghouse. Townsmen crouch over the litters and start loosening the towing straps from the corpses. Faint sounds stir from deep within the settlement and coalesce into slamming doors, barking dogs, and screaming women. Soon enough, the women stream into the courtyard, clutching-up their skirts to speed their legs. Townsmen scatter and tear them away, cursing and shouting. The sentry guards sprint over to assist them, leaving the front gates open and unguarded. Now’s your chance, I tell myself. Go! Go! Go! I sprint along the stockade wall toward the front gates. Halfway there, my eye’s drawn to a massive black form rising-up at my side. The sound of horse hooves beats the ground in a furious gallop. A shadow rears-up against the blackness and comes to a sliding halt in front of the front gates, blocking my escape. I stumble to a halt and my eyes go wide in terror—it’s Barnhart on his horse! Bursts of dirt rain down from the horse’s hooves and the sudden halt brings it down to its haunches.

“Ellie Williams!” Barnhart yells, tracking me down his shotgun barrel. “Don’t you move a muscle!” He balances in the saddle as the horse grunts and works himself back up to a stand. My lips part soundlessly, too terrified to speak. He knows. Of course he knows! He probably knew from the moment he found me. At my back, the drumming footfalls of the townsfolk rush toward us. I don’t dare look. I sense their presence behind me as they gather around. The flickering flames of their torches sharpen Barnhart’s face in candlelight. “I’ve got a gun and it’s aimed right at you,” he says. “As a legal representative of the law in these parts, I’m placing you under arrest for aiding and abetting manslaughter. Don’t try to run! I’m taking you in!”

“My name’s Sarah Smith,” I say and I’m surprised at how calm my voice sounds.

“Liar! You’re Ellie Williams and there's serious charges against you, Miss Williams!”

“I don’t know anything about that.”

“So what are you doing out here?”

“Drifting,” I say, and he scoffs and says, “You’re tied-up with Joel Miller!” My heart skips a beat and I say, “I have no idea who that is.” He reaches into his jacket pocket, pulls-out a folded handbill, and tosses it at my feet. The bounty. “There it is!" he yells. "Now what do you gotta say for yourself?”

“You’ve got nothing on me!” I yell. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“No use resisting arrest. You’ve been pretty slick but I’ve got you now! Put your arms straight out and hold your hands together.” I don’t move nor speak, frozen to the spot. “You’re my prisoner, Miss Williams,” he continues. “My job’s to take you dead or alive. Exactly how I go about it won’t make much of a difference and whether I bring you in dead or alive won’t make much of a difference, either. I can always shoot you for resisting arrest. Now hold out your hands.” I won’t go voluntarily. I won’t. The end of me would be the end of Joel. Maybe I can stall him. Maybe the horse thieves are still out there, watching and waiting, and they’ll come storm this place for more horses. Burn this whole place down to the ground and kill everyone right where they stand. I pray for this to happen. God, please make this happen, I pray silently. “Wait!” I yell. “Let’s figure something out!” His face changes at this, thinking about what I said. After a moment, he lays his shotgun perpendicular to his saddle and says, “I’mma tell you what. I ain’t hurrying none. I’mma give you a head start. Count of ten.”

What? What’s this? What kind of game is this? He wheels his horse from the gate and leads him upfield. The townsfolk part silently around him. I look at their faces in the torchlight. They’re silent and sober but their manner’s hostile. They’ll chase me down till they capture me. This is clear. He halts his horse in the middle of the courtyard and calls-out to me across the distance, “Run.” I stand immobile, frozen to the spot. If I run, he’ll cut me down and say I resisted arrest. If I manage to evade him, his mob will capture me. Nothing will stop them. They’ll rage like a wildfire till they burn themselves out. If I don’t make a run for it, he’ll arrest me anyway. “Run!” he yells, unholsters his pistol, and aims it at my feet. Pack! Dirt splatters in front of my boots from his fired bullet and adrenaline whips me into flight. I rip through the gates and cross onto a long grassy field. I run in a hobbled gait, as fast as I can go with my injured ankle, and head for the closest ridgeline because his horse won’t be able to go as fast in the dense woods. I’ll run till I get out of the timber and I'll find shelter.

I hear him counting-off from the courtyard and this makes everything worse. “One! Two! Three! Four! Five!” I sprint toward the timber, my ankle throbbing maliciously. “Six! Seven! Eight! Nine! Ten!” I cross the ridgeline, my lips pared back in terror and my eyes streaming tears. “Ready or not, here I come!” I slash blindly through the forest, low branches whipping my face. Horse hooves thunder at my back and cracking branches whip across its hide. My foot catches a root and I crash to the ground, tumbling forward. I lay momentarily dazed before I begin struggling to rise.

Behind me, Barnhart’s horse whinnies sharply and slides to a halt, and his boots thud down at my side. He pins me to the ground on my stomach. I thrash against him, screaming piercing bestial panic. He yanks back my head by my hair, rips mud from the ground, and shoves a handful into my mouth to silence me. I gag against the icy muddy sludge. He lets me go and I sense his whole body rearing back. Crack! The world goes dark with a visceral blow.


	16. Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Sixteen

“Wake the fuck up!” a cruel bass voice yells. I don't need to open my eyes to know where I am. I don’t want to open them because I don’t want to see. Maybe I’m still dreaming. No. I know I’m not dreaming. I’m awake and this is a nightmare. I’m back at Providence.

“Hands on your fucking head!” another voice yells. “Don’t fucking move!” Two guards in baggy mismatched battle dress uniforms haul me from my small windowless cell and march me toward Eph’s office. Shattered windows, blood splattered walls, and charred floors narrate the Firefly raid aftermath and the lack of manpower to clean it, no prisoners left alive for work detail. My heart knifes at the thought of Bishop and the men but at least they’re no longer in this hellhole.

We get to Eph’s office and I’m shoved into a chair at a low table. There’s a water pitcher and an empty tumbler on it so I suppose we’re playing the water game again. I look around the room and I don’t see Eph. I pray he’s dead. At the windows overlooking the courtyard, a tall broad man stands with his back to me. I know who it is before he turns around—Barnhart. “You fucking piece of shit!” I yell at him across the room and he yells back, “Don’t talk to me! We ain’t on speaking terms!”

“Fuck you!” I yell and glare at him with cold hostility. “I don’t know who you are,” he answers. “I never saw you before in my whole life!” A door creaks open at the back of the room and out comes Eph. He walks over in deliberate strides, his boots clacking over the wooden floors. “What the fuck’s he doing here?” I yell at him, meaning Barnhart. 

“That doesn’t concern you,” he says. “Shut your goddamn mouth.” He stops in front of me and bridges his hands to his drop-belt hung with a polished revolver. I smell his powdered perfume coming off of his blouse and stiff indigo jeans. I don’t like this smell. I don’t like being here. I shouldn’t be here. This shouldn’t be happening. This place shouldn’t even exist anymore! The Fireflies should've burnt it to the ground. Why didn't they just burn it to the ground? “It’s been a while,” he says.

“Not long enough,” I say and he laughs dryly, and says, “You’ve made a power of trouble and some mighty hard feelings.” He pours water into the glass and offers it to me. “Where have you been keeping yourself?” he asks, and I don’t speak nor move. “You know what happens when you don’t cooperate," he continues. "No one’s here to tend to your wounds no more.” So the Fireflies must’ve killed the Dentist when they got to Joel. Good. Why the fuck didn’t they kill Eph? What the fuck were they thinking? Fact is, you can’t demote a king. They either succeed or they’re beheaded. The Fireflies knew this and they didn’t care. Eph will continue to torture innocent men till he’s gone from this earth. “You’ve been knocked out a couple days,” he continues and slides the glass toward me. “You’re dry as a bone. Go on, drink.”

I think about this for a moment. Injured ankle aside, I’m in peak physical condition, and free of infection and disease. I won’t survive Providence’s hardships nor Eph’s temper for very long. I know this. This place is certain death. I have no choice but to conspire until I can plan a quick escape—the sooner, the better. I take the glass and drink lustfully, water cascading my chin. He laughs at this and says, “Look at what a bad crack on the head’ll do to a poor child’s mind! I’ve never seen you act more sensible in my life.” He refills my empty glass and I drink it in one long gulp. “Tell me everything,” he continues. “The Rock. Lith. The Fireflies. How long were you there?”

“A week,” I say and gesture for more water, and he pours another glassful. “Where about?” he asks.

“I don’t know.”

“Do as you’re told, child.”

“They put a hood over my head, in and out.”

“What’d you see when they took it off?” he asks.

“It was a lot nicer than this hellhole,” I say and he laughs, and asks, “Where were they taking you?”

“They didn’t tell me.”

“Salt Lake City?”

“That’d be my guess.”

“The Smuggler?”

“What do you wanna know?” I ask.

“He ain’t alive,” Barnhart says dismissively. “He ain’t worth a damn.”

“Where is he?” Eph asks me.

“We got separated,” I say.

“How’d you meet my deputy?” he asks and glances at Barnhart. I gasp, my lips parting soundlessly. “That’s right,” Eph continues with a cruel smile. “That there’s my star deputy. We’re blood brothers in this here deal.” I knew Barnhart was an idiot but partnering with Eph takes it to another level. I glare at Barnhart and address Eph, “Ask him yourself.”

“I wanna hear it from you,” Eph says.

“He found me,” I say.

“I saved you!” Barnhart yells.

“Where’s Lith?” Eph asks.

“She’s dead,” I say.

“Liar!” Barnhart yells.

“No one’s talking to you!” I yell at him.

“You were more dead than alive when I found you!” Barnhart yells. “I brought you back to life!”

“You kidnapped me! You lied to me!”

“Nothing personal here! The whole country knows your story and when it reaches the arms of the law, the law’s gotta act. I need those weapons same as everyone else. I’ve got a price on my head, same as you.”

“I hope they find you and fucking kill you!” I yell.

“Enough!” Eph yells, his face darkening in anger. “Y’all are hollering like hysterical little girls!” He addresses me. “Where is she?” he asks, meaning Lith.

“Dead,” I say. “She’s dead.”

“Her story don’t jibe!” Barnhart yells. He reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls something out. He holds it up in his hand and I realize it’s a charred piece of Lith’s scarlet scarf. “We done found that car all burnt up, found all ’em fancy Firefly firearms. Wasn’t nobody there!”

“Corpses don’t just walk off by themselves,” Eph says and looks at me fixedly.

“Maybe a coyote finished them off,” I say with a shrug. This is something. I don’t trust Barnhart’s word but if the car was found empty, this could mean a couple things. Kitson and Graf were dead on impact. I saw this. This is a fact. I suppose the rebels who ambushed us found the wreckage and pulled their corpses from the car. Or scavengers came and collected their charred bones to make broth. Who knows? Maybe Lith survived the crash and escaped the ambushers. If she did, she’s luckier than me. She's not stuck at Providence.

“You’re telling me a pack of lies,” Eph says.

“I’m not lying,” I say. “Please. I cooperated. I told you everything I know.”

“You gave me the answers you wanted to give me, not the ones I wanted. I’m gonna get the truth outta you and don’t you forget it!”

“Please let me outta my cell. Like last time.”

“Don’t ask me that,” he says. “You’re lucky you’re still alive.”

“Please,” I beg.

“You can beg, but you’ll find no mercy here.”

“I promise I’ll behave.”

“Nothing left for you now but to burn time. Days and days and days of it.”

“I’m not asking for kindness. I’m just asking to be treated like a human.”

“Man proposes, God disposes.” He gestures to the guards, and they grab me and escort me to my cell.

–––––––

A rocket ship. A lion. A giraffe. I study the scabby ceiling laid flat on my bunk, the closest thing to looking up at the clouds. With little diversion to break-up the hours, my days stretch interminably—silent, dark, empty, and grim. Guards rarely pass. There aren’t many left after the raid and the ones remaining are jittery, excitable, nervous, and distrustful of anything that looks faintly suspicious.

Fact is, there’s little hope of escape. After one week of lock-up, I’ve developed a nagging cough from the moldy leaden air. I’m despondent and listless. I sleep often and wake abruptly from troubled vivid dreams with Joel’s voice ringing in my ears. Seeing him in my dreams is a fleeting comfort, followed by restless longing and crushing heartache. That day at the quarry, he promised me nothing would ever separate us—not now, not ever. Now what? Hopelessness descends. I feel the tears coming so I drape my arm over my eyes and my knuckles brush against my ear, reminding me the tip is gone, severed by Barnhart’s stock when he struck me down. I’m overcome by self-loathing and humiliation. I despise myself. I’m deeply scornful of my flaws and limitations. I don’t want to cry but my eyes start to fill with tears. Just as I start crying, I hear boot steps coming down the hall. I swallow my tears, rush to the door, and watch through the steel bars. It’s a guard. He strides past with a familiar hawk-nosed profile and I realize it’s the same one who offered me an egg in exchange for sex, so I yell, “Eggman! Eggman! Wait!” He flashes me a quick look but doesn’t stop walking. “Wait!” I continue, “Please!”

He stops and looks at me, and says, “That ain’t my name,” so I ask him, “What is it?” “You want something?” he continues. “You! I want you!” I yell and he starts back down the hallway. “Wait!" I yell after him. "I wanna ask you something! Please don’t go!” He turns and looks at me with dead expressionless eyes. “Please don’t run off,” I beg, my voice magnanimous. I take my ponytail into my hand and stroke it. “I thought about you every day. Did you think about me?”

“You didn’t want me then,” he says. “Why do you want me now?”

“Come’re and lemme show you,” I say. He ambles to my cell door and squares in front of it. I lower onto my knees, reach through the bars, and rub the front of his pants, digging around for his cock. “I’ll do whatever you want me to do to you,” I say, playing with him. “Just tell me what you want and I’ll do it.” He smiles cruelly and says, “Pull-out my shit and put it in your mouth. You’ll see it swell-up right quick. I’mma watch you suck it till it gets rock hard. Go on.”

“Not like this,” I say and glance at my bunk. “I wanna feel every inch of you inside me.” His cock twitches and he asks, “Suck or fuck?”

“Whatever you want. As many times as you want, for as long as you want.”

“Lemme see that mouth. Lemme see if it can deep-throat my dick. Open-up.” I open my mouth and he and slips his fingers into my mouth. His hands smell foul. I have to stop myself from gagging with every ounce of willpower. He moves my head around, peering into my mouth. “I’mma fuck the back of your throat,” he says, “and you’re gonna swallow every last drop of come.” He slides his filthy fingers deeper and I gag robustly. I can’t hold it back. He likes this because his cock twitches and he continues, “First I’mma come in your mouth till you choke on my come. Then I’mma shove my meat in you and fuck the hell outta you.” He pulls away and continues down the hall, saying, “Tomorrow night, lights out.”


	17. Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen

Human nature isn’t tender. It’s pliable and adaptable. With every new threat, I acclimate and evolve. Joel taught me how to seek out the enemy and destroy without mercy or hesitation. He taught me how to thrust all distractions aside and never deviate from the goal. He taught me how to surge blindly toward an obstacle with fierce temperament and how to battle through, continuous and persistent. He showed me death’s elusive if you know how to kill.

With clear unwavering eyes, I wind through the dark hallways of Providence in Eggman’s military fatigue cap, assault plate carrier, and blood-saturated blouse, my boots sticky in his gore. Everything I wear smells like him, wet with his sweat and blood. I smell like a dead man. Shortly before lights-out, he came back to my cell, pulled-out his stubby raw red cock, and said, ‘Gonna get my dick wet or what?’ I sat on his knees and squeezed his dick while my other hand found the fixed blade clipped to his nylon belt. I ripped it from its holster and slammed it into his neck, right at the subclavian, just like Joel taught me, and I twisted it deep till his frothed blood bathed the back of my hand warm and wet.

I stalk the halls, searching for an open door or window. If I manage to get out alive, I’ll figure it out from there. I head for the wing where I was previously locked-up and I hear women’s voices. It must be Whore Friday. I think about Bishop and the prisoners, and the last time I saw them alive the night of the raid, and my hands go cold with vengeance. I think of their pointless deaths at the hands of the Fireflies and I want to slaughter them out of existence. I come up to their old cell and something catches my eye in the doorway—a shadow in the form of a man right where Bishop used to wait for me. My heart skips a beat. Bishop? It can’t be. It can’t be. It is! It’s him! He stares at me with wide eyes, his lips parting in amazement. “Ellie,” he whispers and I rush over to him. We grasp at each other's hands through the bars. Our mouths work silently, unable to articulate a single word. Prisoners fan around him, their eyes incredulous, doubting my presence. “They said you were dead,” I whisper. “All of you.”

“We ain’t dead as long as we’re still breathing,” he says with a laugh and I know I have to break them out of here. I won’t leave them behind. I start to hand him my load-out through the steel bars—an assault rifle, a submachine gun, a 9mm pistol, and a fixed blade. He smiles and says, “New deck, new deal. Shuffle ’em cards!” I dig into my pocket and pull-out Eggman’s keyring. After a tense minute, I find the master and rush into the cell where Bishop and I cling to each other, weakly laughing and crying. All around us, prisoners slap each other’s backs and hug, and shake each other's hands. “Ready to hunt them down and shoot them out?” I ask him and he says, “Since the day I got here.” “We’ve gotta get to Eph,” I say and the prisoners grumble dissent.

“Get the fuck outta here, little girl,” Hutch says. “I ain’t sticking around any longer than it takes me to find the first door.”

“We need his fleet,” I say.

“I’m with Hutch,” Karate Kid says.

“I’m out the closest window,” Tigerman says.

“You’re the walking wounded,” I say. “You’ll never make it off the grounds.” The men curse, toss up their hands in exasperation, and cross their arms defiantly over their chests. Look, I’m not insisting on stealing Eph’s fleet out of a sense of high adventure. The fact is these men won’t make it off the grounds alive. What’s the point of escaping their cell only to be slaughtered at the front gates? But there’s another reason I want to force a showdown with Eph: I want to see him dead. I want to make sure he never walks this earth among kind decent people ever again.

Bishop sweeps a hand over his head and addresses the prisoners, “Y’all motherfuckers better get real. Half y’all can’t even figure-out how to get outta your own shoes but y’all are trying to tell Ellie how to run things?”

“I wouldn’t let that bitch run my bath water!” Day-Day yells. The prisoners laugh and so do I. It was a good joke and I’m happy to give them something to laugh about, but Bishop doesn’t laugh and says to them, “Man, sit your dumb ass down! Y’all motherfuckers are stupid as fuck. If you’re with me and her, all’s well and good, and if you ain’t? When a man’s been warned and he won’t listen, there’s nothing more to be said.” He takes me by the shoulder and looks at me with deep pride in his eyes, “Last I checked, this here’s our leader. She’s dealing a new deck and she’s got the ace—let her play it. If anyone thinks she ain’t playing it straight, show a hand.” No one moves nor speaks so Bishop continues, “I reckon that ends it. You’re running it now.” I scan the prisoners’ faces—tensed, guarded, and grim—and say, “Don’t worry. I’ll be the first asshole to get shot.” Bishop laughs at this and says, “We’ll make sure you’re the last. Turn that trick. Let’s bust this place wide open!”

I brass check my pistol and task the men, “Bishop and I take the lead. Unarmed men go to the middle, like a wedge. Whoever else’s armed goes on overwatch.” I swing open the door and say, “Follow me and wait for me to fire. Unload your weapons, use everything you’ve got.” We stream into the hallway into a wedge formation and stalk toward the command post. I wait until the guards and whores come into view, and give the command to fire. We blaze rounds till nothing moves, sweep the bodies, strip their load-out, and push toward the main stairwell, killing everything that moves on ascent.

We kick through Eph’s office doors and flood into the room, greeted by enemy fire. We take cover behind overturned furniture, and trill rounds until the enemy bullets taper and a dozen guards lay dead on the floor. From a back office, a sub-machine gun coughs and fires. We duel rounds till it stops. I wait for the smoke to clear and call-out to whoever’s in there, dead or alive, “We’ve got a whole bunch of M67s and we’re about to throw them in!” It’s a bluff. We don’t have grenades because there were none to sweep from the dead soldiers. “Toss out your weapons! Come out with your hands on your head!”

Two 9mm submachine guns slide down the floor from the office and come to a halt midway, propelled by whoever’s in there. A shotgun follows—Barnhart’s engraved shotgun. “We don’t want none of them grenades!” he yells and hobbles through the door with Eph. They mince toward us with wild eyes, their hair powdered in crumbled plaster. “Keep those hands up, you lucky motherfuckers!” I yell. Men haul them onto their bellies and clip them to the floor with their assault rifles. I grab a 9mm submachine gun from one of the dead guards and squat in front of Eph. He looks at me directly with a genial smile and says, “Surely you ain’t gonna kill me.”

“What makes you so sure?” I ask.

“You’re too much of a kindly one to kill a poor old warden, his prison devastated by raids.”

“What do you propose I do with you?”

“Name your price. Let’s work something out. Whatever you want and need, I’ll make sure you get it.”

“We all know there’s only one way outta this,” I say. His face blanches, and his eyes widen and shift in bursts, and he asks, “Y’all know the story of Joseph? From the Bible?”

“Man up, you punk-ass bitch!” Karate Kid yells and jabs his shoulder with his muzzle. “Hear me out,” Eph says, his forehead blobbed in fat sweat.

“Handle your business, child!” Karate Kid threatens me but I’ll let Eph speak. A dying man’s entitled to his last words. I hope to have the same courtesy when my turn to die comes. “Make it quick,” I say to him and address the men, “Get him to his knees.” I expect an argument but they haul Eph onto his knees. He glances around the room and speaks, “My namesake’s Ephraim, born of Joseph’s House. Joseph was one of Jacob’s twelve sons from a family of shepherds. He was a good industrious son. His father loved him the most and gave him a coat of many colors. This made his brothers jealous and resentful. One day, his father told him to go check on them herding sheep, high in the mountains. When they saw him coming, they figured he was meddling and wanted to kill him but some merchants came along, so they sold him into slavery where he was bought by a rich man. Joseph was a good slave but the rich man grew tired of him and sent him to jail where word went around he had a special gift. He could interpret dreams. One night, Pharaoh, the King of Egypt, had a strange dream and summoned him. He listened to the dream and said it foretold of a great famine. He advised the king to grow corn for seven years and to build great barns to store it in. The king was so pleased, he made him a ruler of his kingdom, and gave him an army of chariots and beautiful robes. For seven years, the Egyptians grew corn and stored it up, and just like Joseph predicted, a great famine spread across the land. One day, a group of men came from a faraway kingdom to buy corn and what do you know—it was Joseph’s brothers. Was he unkind to them?”

“He killed ’em sons of bitches!” Day-Day says and the prisoners laugh. “He returned good for evil,” Eph says. “He prepared a great feast and sent them off full of corn and grain, as much as they could carry.”

“Is that the moral of the story?” I ask. “Forgive your enemies? The ones who tried to kill you? The ones who sold you into slavery and left you to rot in prison?”

“Clemency,” he says. “Turn the other cheek. Do good unto those who’ve deceived you. Treat them with kindness and pray for their souls.” What’s a godless man like him talking about kindness and clemency? Nonsense and hypocrisy. I swing up my submachine gun and stamp the muzzle against his greasy temple. “Wait!” he yells. “I’m not done!” I look around at the men and ask them, “Who wants to hear more?” Some laugh while others, like Karate Kid, scowl. He massages his rifle and says to me, “If you don’t kill Preacher Man, I’mma shoot him up myself!”

“His bitch ass doesn’t deserve a bullet!” Hutch yells.

“Let’s rope him and drag him!” Tigerman yells. “He’s earned it!”

“Lemme stomp him out!” Day-Day yells. “Please,” Eph says and flags a hand. “I meant no harm. You wouldn’t shoot a man for doing his duty, would you? I appeal to your sense of honor. On bended knee.”

“I’m afraid I’ve got none left to spare,” I say.

“I’ve offended you. I kindly ask for your forgiveness.”

“My forgiveness’ not so easily given.” I gesture at the men to lay Eph back down on the floor and they lead him down on his belly. He resists and yells, “Wait! Lemme die on my feet like a man!”

“Don’t get used to that idea,” I respond. “The rest of your life’s gonna be pretty damn short.” I press my muzzle against the back of his head. He yelps and squeezes his eyes shut, anticipating my bullet. Right as I massage the trigger, someone grabs my arm firmly by the elbow and leads it away. Bewildered, I turn to look to find Bishop. What’s he doing? Has Eph’s moralistic story about forgiveness and turning the other cheek gotten to him? God, I hope not. The little I know about Bishop is he’s a man of deep faith. He’s got a strong belief in God. Is he going to make the case to let Eph go and use some Bible-spouting nonsense to justify it? If he does, he’ll have a fight on his hands. From all of us. I hope he knows this. I hope he knows what he’s doing. “What are you doing?” I ask, baffled.

“You’ll find out soon enough,” he says and addresses the men, gesturing at Eph, “Get him up."

“Hell no!” Day-Day yells. “Let him die on his belly like the snake he is!” Bishop takes Eph by the arm and starts leading him to his feet, and the the men let him do it. I suppose they’re just as curious as me. What the hell’s he doing, is what we’re all thinking. We won’t have to wait long to find out. Bishop cradles his submachine gun to his chest and massages the stock with his free hand. A chilling smile settles on his face, full of contempt and cold grim humor. I don’t know what we’re in for but it’s definitely not forgiveness or clemency. I’m sure of this. 

“My name’s John Henry Bishop,” he says to Eph, his voice commanding, and his chin swept high and proud. “You got that? I was named after the brave free black man who built this country with the blood, sweat, and tears of his brave free black brothers.” His eyes burn fiercely with rage. “You held me captive, kept me chained in this prison for two years! Two years of my life _gone_! Do you know what it means to have two years stolen from a man’s short life in the prime of his life? Do you know what it means for a man to be ripped from his home and the folks he loves? Do you know what it means for a man to wonder every minute of every day where his family is, praying they’re already dead so they ain’t dying alone in terror? Do you know what it means for a man to learn his family was murdered and left to die while he was locked-up, unable to defend them, unable to say goodbye, unable to dig them a grave? It doesn’t mean nothing to you, does it? Suffering and misery and torture mean nothing to you!”

Eph works his lips soundlessly, his words dying in his mouth, and Bishop continues, “Two years ago my life ended and today you’ve finally come to the end of yours. I’ve been waiting for this day, for this very moment, since your men ripped me away from my family and my home, and brought me here to die. Two years of my life beaten and tortured outta me, my youth long behind me. You’ve chosen the wrong brother to fuck with and the wrong brother to steal from. I’mma die with a hammer in my hand and I’mma drive it home!” He grabs his submachine gun by the muzzle like a baseball bat, cries-out defiantly, swings it past his shoulder, and hammers it into Eph’s head. Crack! A mighty blood splatter sprays across the room. Eph’s head snaps back viciously and he folds lifelessly to the ground. Bishop straddles him, and hammers his stock into his head until his skull disintegrates and thick black blood snakes the floor spattered with spongy brain matter. I’ve never seen so much blood come from a dead man. I swear it’s practically pouring out of him like a fountain. The men glance at each other with grim eyes and blank faces. The ones standing close to Bishop wipe away splattered gore from their faces and hands. I feel nothing. Fact is, Eph was a brutal man and he deserved a brutal death. There’s no loss to the world with his death. He’s dead and the world goes on. It doesn’t matter one way or the other.

Barnhart starts to sob sloppily so I go over to him. His face is wet with tears, and flecked with Eph’s brain matter and blood clots. “He got what he deserved,” I say. “Now what about you?”

“I don’t wanna die!” he yells and peers up at me, his pitiful eyes rimmed red. “Not like this! I’ve got five young’uns at home and two more on the way. I’ve already buried a dozen. Please don’t kill me!”

“I can’t oblige you,” I say.

“I done sinned. Please forgive me for whatever wrongs I’ve done.”

“I can pardon a sin but I can’t pardon betrayal.”

“How are you gonna kill the man who gave you back your life?” he asks. I don’t respond. I won’t be swayed. “I’ll disappear!” he continues. “You’ll never see me again! I give you my word!”

“Your word?" I yell. "The word of a liar!”

“I never claimed to be an angel! I was just doing my duty, following orders. Catching outlaws is my business! I always aim to do what I’m told. I don’t let no prejudices interfere with justice. When I bring a man down, I do it on the level. I gave you a chance and you took it, fair and square! Ain’t my fault I was born to trail! Please don’t kill me! I ain’t ready to die!”

“You’re ready enough,” I say. “You just don’t have the balls.” He sobs, slobbering and trembling over the floor, and says, “You saw it yourself—my modest house is always open to all who pass. I share my bread with those who have none! Tell me—is that the life of a bad man?” I think about this. He betrayed me but he saved my life. I would’ve died without him. I would’ve been dead, no doubt, frozen in the snow. He showed me compassion, patched me up, and kept me safe while I was under his care. If there was no bounty involved, I have no doubt he would’ve sent me safely on my way. He deserves a second chance. I won’t take his life and I won’t let anyone else do it, either. I grab him by the arm and lead him to his feet. The prisoners let me do this. Why wouldn’t they? He brought them no harm. “I’ll tell you what,” I say. “I’m gonna let you off clean. On one condition.”

“Please!” he yells. “Whatever you say!”

“Get outta this territory,” I say. “I don’t ever wanna cross paths with you ever again and if I do, I’ll kill you. That’s my offer and if you don’t like it, let me know.”

“Bless you!” he yells.

“Forget about me. Forget you ever met me and I’ll do the same. I’m gonna give you a head start to get outta the range of our bullets.” I massage my submachine gun stock for emphasis. “On the count of ten.” He stares at me, bewildered, his lips trembling, so I flash a wry smile and tell him to run. He rallies his legs into flight and dashes through the doorway without looking back. “Let him be,” I tell the men and some of them laugh. I suppose it’s funny to see the stark terror and cowardice of such a big strong capable man beg for his life. We listen to his boots gallop the stairs till they fade to silence. 

While the men sweep the dead guards and strip their load-out and boots, I rummage Eph’s desk till I find the automobile starters. I look up and notice all the men are gathering at the rear office where Barnhart and Eph sought cover. I go over to see what’s up and I gasp. The office is a large depository with metal shelving loaded with supplies and weapons. Jackpot! The floor glitters with heaps of jewels spilled from storage bins, shattered by our gunfire. A couple men crouch over the piles and sift through the layers of watches, keyrings, necklaces, cufflinks, cigarette lighters, and bracelets stripped from past prisoners. Bishop holds the gold wedding bands up to the light of the windows washed in twilight. He reads the inscriptions and passes them to their rightful owners. The men slip them on, and press their hands over their hearts and lips, tears rolling down their cheeks.

Something familiar catches my eye. It can’t be. It is! Joel’s watch! I grab it and press it to my lips, and I’m overcome with the certainty he’s still alive. I know him too well to believe otherwise. Long inured to isolation, hardship, suffering, and the discomforts of weather and starvation, Joel will never back down. He’ll never surrender. He’s determined to survive and start over. What one could possibly endure in this world, he could. Nothing takes the fight out of him.

We make our way from the office with our guns swung to combat-ready and it’s clear not a single guard remains. Those who haven’t been killed have retreated and fled. We jog the grounds bathed in twilight and head toward the brick row garages where we crank-up the panel doors to serviceable pick-up trucks. I divide the keys and the men pack tightly into the flatbeds. We blast through the chain-link front gates, and travel through the night in a caravan. The gas tanks run dry as the stars bleach into the dawn sky. We park on a flat grassy plain edged by a small creek. We lay over the creek and scoop-up handfuls of water, which tastes like hickory from the tree roots bordering the banks. The men strip naked, hoist into the water, and scrub themselves down with branches until their skin’s shiny and clean.

Someone finds a couple single-edge razor blades in a glove compartment and wrenches-off the rearview mirrors. The men squat over the banks, pass around the razors and mirrors, and eagerly remove old-growth beards. They grin wide and sheepishly at their freshly-shaved faces in the mirrors, and they can’t stop running their hands over their smooth clean skin. Someone sparks a cooking fire, and a group of men wade to the opposite shore and scavenge ripe hickory nuts to roast in the flames.

I sit at Bishop’s side in the tall grass and tell him everything that’s happened since I saw him last—all about Lith, Joel, the Fireflies, Shadow’s End, the ambush, and Barnhart. All around us, men gorge themselves on roasted nuts and lay on their backs. They watch the sunrise with placid tranquil eyes, breathing-in deep draughts, unaccustomed to the fresh air and sunlight. I realize it’s the first sunrise some of them have probably seen in years. Bishop doesn’t take his eyes off the sky for a long, long time and when he does, I ask him, “How do you feel?”

“Just like them,” he says and looks around at the men’s serene placid faces. “I feel just like them.”

“Freedom,” I say.

“We owe you our lives,” he says and fondles his wedding band. “You lifted us back into ourselves, helped us remember our strength. We forgot how powerful we were. That place tried to kill us. It tried to grind us down and defeat us. But it couldn’t put-out the flames in our hearts. We’re ready to sweep across this land like a storm of lightning!”

“What’s the first thing you’re gonna do?” I ask.

“Find my kids and get back on my boat. I can’t wait to see the water. I never wanna see no ugly brick tenements the rest of my life. Sailing’s in my blood. There’s an old family record that lists the Bishops clear into George Washington’s time. The men on my father’s side were all sailors. One found himself stranded in South Africa. He set sail from the Cape of Good Hope and worked his way to America on a brig as an assistant cook. I could sail a boat at midnight with no stars.” He pulls to his feet and swings his submachine gun over his shoulder. “I don’t know about you but I’m in a rush to make up for lost time. A promise’s a promise. You and Imani are about the same age. You’re gonna love her and I know she’s gonna love you, too.”

I pull to my feet and face him square. I won’t go with him. I’m going back to the Rock to find Joel. He must read this on my face because his lips pull straight and thin lines settle between his eyes. “Don’t you do it!” he yells and points a stern finger at me. “Don’t you even think about it!”

“I’ve made-up my mind,” I say.

“Unless you’re the strongest bravest toughest motherfucker alive, that’s a death wish!”

“Wherever he goes, I go.”

“You’ll die out there!”

“How I plan to die’s my own choice.”

“No one can go it alone! It’s too dangerous for an entire army, better yet one little girl. I’m coming with you.”

“No! They’ll kill you! They’ll have orders to shoot. They won’t kill me. The price on my head’s too high. Affairs of honor, she said.”

“There’s no honor among fifth columns! Man, fuck the Fireflies!”

“She took an oath to protect her men and women at all costs. She wouldn’t risk my life.”

“You can’t deny a free man his rights!” he yells.

“You know their methods,” I say. “They’re assassins.”

“Yeah, I know,” he says plaintively, his mouth pulled into a bitter line. “And you know they’re dangerous. Ellie, please don't go. Let it be.”

“You’re in no shape to fight,” I say. “Your family’s waiting for you. Go to them. Don’t worry about me.” I jostle my submachine gun over my shoulder. “You can follow me but you’ll die. You know that, don’t you?”

After a long moment, he says, “God be with you,” and I know it’s his way of saying goodbye and giving me his blessing. I turn from him and break into a run, flying like I’ve got wings on my feet. Don’t follow me, I yell at him silently. I can handle this on my own. I’d better.


	18. Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Eighteen

Knock! Knock! Knock!

I freeze and stop what I’m doing, which is having one of my crying fits in the well shed. If the knocks had come from the front door, I’d be in terror. It'd mean someone’s come to rip me from the world and drag me to Hell. Only the military knock. Or lunatics like the New Millenniums. Joel said before the Critical, people used to leave their doors open. He said this as a fact. Could you imagine this? If doors ever open, they open a sliver to a mouth threatening you, a terrified eye staring back at you, or the muzzle of a gun greeting you.

Knock! Knock! Knock! The knocks come again, this time more insistent. “Who is it?” I ask, an absurd question. Who could it be but Joel? There’s no one but us on this vast open flat bordered by timbered rolling mountains where we built our fort-like home of thick grey adobe walls. It’s just me, him, and the timber wolves. “Open up,” he says and I ask, “What do you want?” 

“You! I want you! Open up!”

“Why?”

“I wanna cry with you.”

“I’m. Not. Crying.” I have to say each word emphatically to get it past my wretched bitter lips.

“Well, whatever you’re doing in there, I wanna be doing it with you,” he says. I don’t want to let him in. He’s probably just worried I’m going to hurl our precious glass jars of preserves from the shelves. Or throw myself down the stone-lined well from the sheer crushing weight of inescapable grief. I suppose when I didn’t come back to the breakfast table after I excused myself a couple minutes ago, he got suspicious. Why wouldn’t he? He’s seen my crying fits before and they’re not pretty, raging and screaming till I pass-out or puke. And yes, maybe one time I smashed a couple glass jars of our precious preserves but it was an accident. Why would I do something like that on purpose? Do you know what a massive pain in the ass canning is? We have a couple covetable glass jars that can’t be fitted with covers, so we use oak cork, and brush them over with wax made from resin and beeswax. I don’t like preserves. I prefer to eat my fruit fresh. Freshly-picked blackberries and raspberries, bigger than Joel’s thumb, eaten with a big bowl of frothing milk still warm from the sheep, bubbling in the pail with the cream rushing to the top.

I wipe away my tears with the backs of my hands, dry them on my long homespun skirt, and open the door to Joel. His eyes are soft and tender. Not suspicious or bewildered, which is reassuring because it means I haven’t gone too far away from this world. He tries to step into the room but I block him, holding onto the door frame with both hands. “There’s not enough room for you, Joel,” I say. I’m being difficult.

“I reckon there’s plenty of room for both of us,” he says.

“There is, if you stay right there.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then you can have the room to yourself. I didn’t ask you to come.”

“I’m staying and I expect no more arguments.” He takes me in his arms and tucks my head under his. I’m overcome by a fresh round of tears, the misery too great to bear in silence. My heavy heart urges me to seek the ground and he follows my lead, lowering himself to the cool flagstone floor strewn with fragrant straw. He sits with his back against the wall and he draws me into his lap. I sob, tucked between his legs and his arms, curled against his chest. “There you go,” he says with a soft voice. He pets my hair and rubs my back, resting his head against mine. “Get it all out. Get it outta your system. You’ll feel better. Don’t go carrying it around.”

I cry until all my tears are shed. I listen to the blood pounding in his heart and the breath in his lungs, and it’s a reminder we’re still alive. We live. I should be thankful. I should feel blessed. Sometimes it's difficult to remember these things. He pushes back the hair from my face and looks at me with warm melted eyes. I love Joel completely. It’s never changed and it never will. There’s always him. Wherever he goes, I go. That’s where I find myself at home.

–––––––

The Night preceding the Day arrives.

Joel field-strips his guns at the big spruce table, which he does every night after dinner whether they need to be cleaned or not. It’s what he does. I’m on the floor in front of the fire mending one of his flannel shirts. He clears his throat. He's got something to say. “Thought I’d head up around Ten Mile Stream and work my way along Silvergrass Mountain,” he says to his rifle laid on the table. He says this to his rifle because he knows he can’t look me in the eye when he announces solo scout. He knows it kicks me in the heart. I feel it pounding away in my chest as he tells me his itinerary. “Then I’ll come down the West Fork to Blacktail Creek and point Honor homeward.”

“What for?” I ask. Why should I bother asking? It doesn’t matter where he goes or why. He could tell me he’s setting-off to wrangle dragons in China for all I care. I feel his absence all the same. I knew he was getting lonesome for a big adventure. I could feel it coming-on in his restless muscles and I could see that faraway look in his eyes. Something leads him and he has to seek it out. He’s always been this way. “I wanna see what’s doing with those big tracks we saw out yonder,” he says.

“For how long?” I ask, trying to make my voice sound casual and unconcerned, not like my insides are churning away in agony thinking about all the hidden dangers out there that could take him away from me. Like I’m not thinking about how infinitesimal and abandoned I feel when he leaves me behind. Like I’m not thinking about all the ways he could die, leaving me to suffer his absence in this big house in the middle of this wild rough mountainous territory. “I’m going pretty far,” he answers. He’s being evasive. He’s drawing it out to lessen the blow.

“How many days?” I ask, not wanting to know the answer but needing to know all the same.

“I reckon six.”

“Six?” I ask, alarmed.

“I’m expecting to. Three days out and three days back.” This is where a more self-assured woman would say something like, ‘Oh? You only need _six_ days for such a long hard journey? An expert horseman and marksman like yourself only needs _six_ days? Well, bon voyage, arrivederci, and happy hunting! See you in a week!’ One day without him feels like an eternity. Six days will feel like hell! For the first time in my life, I’m attached to everyone and everything. I’m not sentimental. This has to be said. When you don’t have many possessions, you become attached to the smallest things.

I go over to him and throw my arms around his neck from behind. I drape myself against him, smelling our fragrant cedar soap on his skin and feeling his warmth against my body. Don’t make a scene, I tell myself. Let him go off on his adventures. Let him get it out of his system. Let him have some peace and quiet from my incessant talking and fussing, and needing to be fucked every single day. Let him be. He reaches back a hand and squeezes my arm reassuringly. No use begging him to stay. He can’t and he won’t.

I pull out the chair next to him and draw it up to him, facing him. I sit and throw one of my legs over the arm of the chair. I tug at my skirt, pulling it away from my legs and up to my waist. I’m not wearing any panties. He can see everything smooth, pink, and shiny between my legs, and I don’t care. He looks at me directly. His expression looks harassed. He says, “For the love of Christ, Ellie, put your leg down.” I throw my free leg open and closed, again and again. “What’s the matter, Joel?” I ask. “Don’t you wanna fuck me?”

He turns his attention back to his rifle laid in front of him on the table. The back of his neck flushes red with blood. He pretends to be bothered by my insolence but he loves when I taunt him. His reticence is part of the game. He knows I have to be fucked every single day. He knows when I get the idea in my head to be fucked, it’s useless to argue with me. And I know as soon as I get my lips tightly around his cock, his mood’ll change. “But I wanna show you my twat.” I spread my legs further apart. “Tommy’s seen it. He fucked it, too.” This gets his attention. He stops tinkering with his rifle. “Did I ever tell you how he fucked me?” I ask. "Like he was fighting. Like he was trying to fuck-out everyone who came before him. Fuck them clean outta me.”

“You could’ve had anyone but my brother,” he says. “Why didn’t you just leave it alone?”

“Why should I? He had a big dick.”

“Was he a better fuck than me?” he asks.

“I dream about his cock. Dream about sucking him off and playing with his cock. At Jackson, I’d sit between his legs and suck his cock all afternoon. Suck the come clean outta his balls.”

“Where’d you learn all that? Who’d you suck off before him? How many other men?”

“I learned everything from him. He taught me all the things a girl my age shouldn’t have known.”

“Wanna see how hard you’re making me?” he asks.

“I can see from here.” There’s a huge lump in his jeans.

“Well, what’re you gonna do about it?” he asks so I lean over his lap, work down his fly, and dig in my hand. “Wanna have your dick sucked, Joel?” I pull him out and squeeze him in my hand. He’s already nice and hard, and growing bigger by the minute. I dig through his big dark thick bush with my free hand. He reaches under my skirt and starts touching-up my thighs. I crawl into his lap and wriggle across his knees. He unbuckles the leather belt holding-up my skirt and drops it to the ground. He fumbles with the buttons of my waistband and lowers it slowly past my belly, sliding it past my hips and down my legs. He lifts my t-shirt over my head and unhooks my bra, slipping it from my shoulders. I take his cock in my hand and squeeze it hard. He feels up my belly, running his fingers into my navel.

I slip to the floor and crawl between his legs. I grab his cock in one hand and lick his balls, squeezing him tightly as I do it. I stick out my tongue and lick around the head of his cock, jerking him off at the same time. I put him in my mouth, close my lips around him, and lather him up, rubbing my breasts all over his legs. I wrap my arms around his waist, pull myself closer, and stuff his cock down my throat, slobbering all over his lap. He starts making little gasps of pleasure. I know he’s dying to be fucked. I know I’m right when he tells me he’s gonna fill my mouth with come if I don’t stop, so I ease him from my mouth, and he whimpers and gasps. I pull to my feet and shake my ass playfully at him. “I wanna be fucked, Joel!” I run over to the couch, dive across it, and lay naked on my belly. I track him down my shoulder, wiggling my ass from side to side. “Come fuck me, Joel!” He comes over to the couch and starts stripping down naked, his face hurried and tensed. I flip onto my back and spread my legs wide open. I run my fingers into my split and play with myself, making soft little pleased sounds as I watch him undress, taking him all in—his broad shoulders, narrow waist, and thick muscular thighs.

He comes over and climbs between my legs. He takes his cock in one hand and my ankle in his other, and he starts kissing and sucking my legs. He slowly works his way up to my twat. I lift my belly toward him, and he nips at it and moves onto my breasts, licking and kissing and sucking my nipples. I wriggle beneath him on the couch, oohing and aahing. He climbs between my legs and kisses my twat, right over the lips. I dig my fingers through his hair. He holds me wide open with one hand and starts licking my split. He digs in his tongue and fucks me with it till my thighs are dripping wet. I beg him to stop—I’m right on the edge and I want to be fucked. He climbs over me, and I wrap my legs and arms around him, holding onto him tight. I lift my ass into position, begging him to fuck me. He takes himself into his hand and rubs my split with the head of his cock. I’m so hot I’m almost crying.

He lays over me, our bellies pressed together. He throws himself in and works-in the rest of his cock till there’s nothing else to push in. He starts to slowly fuck me and he’s coming almost as soon as he’s in. I feel his come pouring into me, hot and wet, and I start to come, fucking myself out on his cock. I fuck myself against him and hold onto him tight, the couch creaking beneath us. I keep my legs wrapped around him till he comes his last drop, and he climbs off of me and falls onto his side. There’s no way one fucking will be enough for me tonight. I dig around for his cock and take it into my hand, wet and soft, and sticky with his come mixed with mine. I play with it in one hand and play with myself with my other. He kisses me all over my face, pushing his nose along my cheeks and neck. “Lemme ask you something,” he says through kisses. “What’s a girl like you doing with a man like me? A girl fucking a grown man. Don’t you wanna fuck men your own age?”

“I like older men,” I say.

“What’s gonna happen when you grow up? Who’ll satisfy you then?”

What a dumb question. I push him onto his back and climb over him, and run my tongue into his mouth. I can still taste my twat on his lips. I lay over him and play with myself against his thick sweaty bush, gasping little pleased sounds. I work myself down to his legs, kissing and licking and nipping at his belly. I climb between his thighs and he takes his cock into his hand. I let him rub it across my mouth and chin, licking around the head as he does this. I open up my mouth as wide as it’ll go and let him squeeze himself in. I want to suck his cock but I want to be sucked so I pop him out of my mouth and scramble over him, throwing my ass and the backs of my thighs in his face.

I take his cock into my wet hand and squeeze it tight. I feel him rubbing his cheek and his chin all over my twat, warm, wet, and hairy. He takes my ass cheeks into his hands, spreads me wide open, and licks the wetness from my thighs. I bury my nose into his thick sweaty bush and curl my tongue through it, working along his balls, sucking and licking him clean. I squeeze the head of his cock into my mouth and he digs his tongue deep into my split, twisting and turning. I slobber all over his cock, letting it stretch in my mouth till it fills me up to the back of my throat. When I get him back up to where he needs to be, I pull him out of my mouth and fuck the head of his cock with my slippery hand. I flatten my lips against the rest of his cock and suck on it while I fuck him with my hand, sliding my lips down to his balls. I squeeze the head of his cock back into my mouth and bob my head, lathering it up.

He buries his head deeper between my thighs and digs in his tongue, dripping wet. I close my thighs around his head, pushing my twat against his face. He throws his arms around my waist and holds onto me tight. He stuffs his lips into my split and starts to suck me. He sucks me so hard, it feels like he’s turning my whole twat inside-out. I suck his cock halfway down my throat till I feel it explode, his warm come spreading everywhere. I fuck my face against his mouth and I start to come. I’m still coming long after I’ve sucked the last drop from him. He licks the wetness from my thighs, and I stick out my tongue and clean off his soft wet cock. We stay on the couch and play with each other till the fire burns down to glowing embers.


	19. Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen

We rise in the middle of the night and arrange Joel’s load-out on the table. I make him a big breakfast and pack-up his lunch while he prepares his pack, fighting load carrier vest, and bail-out bag. His manner’s upbeat despite the early hour. He’s looking forward to his big adventure. I should be happy to see him so lighthearted but all I want to think about is the great relief that washes over me when I see him riding homeward on Honor in a cloud of billowing dust. If he’s in a good mood, it means he’s got a good bag and we’ll celebrate. I never ask him the size of his bag. He always tells me everything I need to know. When he tells me the tale, I try to be in complete awe of the distance the bag was shot, and how strong he must’ve been to have fired a shot for something running so fast, and flying so high and far. If he’s in a quiet mood, I help him strip his load-out, comment on the weather, commiserate how tough it must’ve been for such a good marksman like him to have missed a shot, and pour him some chicory brew-up. When he tells me about the one that got away, I try to be sympathetic, no matter how many times I’ve heard the story.

The rising sun breaks over the mountaintops. I remind him to eat, to keep his eyes peeled, and to keep himself warm and dry. He slings his long guns to Honor’s saddle, mounts-up, and rides away in a cloud of dust, heading toward Ten Mile Stream. I watch him from the veranda, hugging one of the large spruce columns. A couple times, he twists in the saddle and waves to me across the distance. He knows I hate saying goodbye. In Boston when you said goodbye, you said something like, ‘See ya,’ or, ‘Bye,’ and you turned around and walked away. It’s different out here. Farewells are difficult. Interminable and awkward. You never know if you’ll see that person again.

I can’t get upset with him. He needs his space. Someone needs to stay back and watch over the homestead. I frankly have no desire to go with him. Ten Mile Stream’s one of those bodies of water that goes dry every summer. At this point in the season, it’ll be nothing but a washed-out gulch of mud and rocks. It’s very steep so he’ll let Honor do the picking. He’ll follow it to the head and enter heavy timber, working his way toward the foothills of Silvergrass Mountain where the trail winds up a steep slope and takes you to the top—a long flat ridge carpeted in the mountain’s namesake grass—flanked by a sheer perpendicular cliff. It’s a long hard grind to the top so he’ll have to dismount and lead Honor to save him the climb. He’ll follow the trail till he hits the West Fork and he’ll take it down the opposite side of the mountain to Blacktail Creek. The rough treacherous terrain’s full of pitfalls, including fifth columns and rebels who hole-up in the caves. I don’t like thinking about any part of this journey but I find myself doing it constantly.

–––––––

Two days into Joel’s absence, I wake with an acute sense of anxiety and foreboding. I feel it deep in my gut. Something’s coming off. All day I’m distracted and restless, overwhelmed by this feeling.

Late afternoon, I arrange Joel’s place setting on the table with a big pail of sheep’s milk, a slab of fresh biscuits, and fresh butter covered in mosquito netting. Joel always comes home famished. He’ll snack on the buttered biscuits and milk, and bathe while I cook him a proper supper. I won’t wait-up for him tonight. I want to go to bed so I can wake-up one day closer to his return. I’ll head outside and watch the sunset from the veranda with a mug of brew-up before I go to bed, so I rake-up the embers in the flagstone fireplace, brew-up a mug of chicory ersatz, and grab my rifle propped in the corner. I unbolt the front door’s securing bar, unlatch the big iron hook, and step onto the veranda to the cool crisp air.

I dust the ash from one of the slab benches, hike-up my skirt, and slip my rifle between my knees. I sip my brew-up and watch the sun throw off its last burnished rays, washing the valley red. I never tire of watching the sun set. You never saw it in Boston because the narrow streets and tall buildings shut out the sun. I wait till the sun disappears behind the mountaintops and start to head inside, stopping in the doorway to take one last look. The sky over the mountains is soft, rich, and velvety blue in twilight. In an hour or so, a million stars will swing overhead. Maybe I’ll sleep in the courtyard and watch them. It might help me fall asleep, counting all those stars.

Right before I turn to head inside, my eye’s drawn to a far-off ridge where a black dot moves below a rising cloud of dust. It could be anything, I tell myself. A wild horse, a lone vehicle, a tumbling bolder, some stray cattle. Forget about it, I tell myself. Go inside and get to bed. I watch the dot silently slide down the ridge. Will it continue onward or turn toward the flat and head this way? It makes no sense for it to head this way. Across the distance of a couple miles, nothing would indicate the presence of our house nestled in the hidden valleys and silent mountains. I haven’t struck any firelight so no light would be visible from the windows. The smoke skein spiraling the chimney would be invisible, too, at such a distance, which is why I’m perplexed when it turns and heads straight toward me.

I strain to listen as it approaches over the flats. Soon enough, the steady thrum of hooves is thrown back at me. A horse and its cadence is wild. Fanning it like hell, as Joel would say. Could it be him? A mix of relief and panic washes over me. If he’s home so early and coming-in so fast it would mean something unforeseen has happened and he had to turn homeward unexpectedly. A wound, sickness, or an injury. A loss or theft of his arsenal. This would be a terrible reason for him to point Honor homeward. I pray it's not the case.

The horse approaches in a cloud of dust. I take cover behind a spruce column with my rifle slung to low alert. In the dim twilight, I can make-out the form of a tall rider slumped lifelessly in the saddle. My heart pounds my throat dry and a cold sweat bristles my upper lip. The horse isn’t Honor and the rider isn’t Joel! A trembling cold dread washes over me. I raise my rifle to combat-ready.

The horse draws down to a walk over the last couple yards and halts in front of the house. I track it down my rifle barrel, my eyes watering from the dust as it blows and settles. The horse is tall, grey, and strong. It stands with its legs braced over the ground from the hard ride. The only sound is the huff of its breath and the creak of the leather saddle, rising and falling beneath its heaving sides. The rider sits slumped in the saddle, sagged against the high pommel and bent against the horse’s mane. He’s not unconscious but he’s close to it. His body’s limp. His weight hangs oddly like he’s been lashed to the saddle. I suppose if he wasn’t, he would’ve fallen to the ground already. “You’re trespassing on my land!” I yell. “Take one step forward and I’ll shoot you dead!”

If the rider can talk, he doesn’t. He pitches forward, spills out of his saddle, and plunges head-first to the ground. Dead weight. The horse knickers and scuffs its restless hooves. The rider stirs and clutches blindly for his horse. His limbs are locked-up and jerky. I watch in a mix of horror and curiosity. I suppose he’s trying to reach his horse and pull himself up from the ground but it looks like he’s having some kind of fit. “Stay back!” I yell. “Take one step closer and I’ll kill you!” This is a laughable thing to say at such an incapacitated man but I say it anyway. His limbs lock-up and his head drops lifelessly to the ground. He lays flat and still in the dust. Did I just watch him die? Is he dead? He looks like he’s dead. I approach him cautiously and stand over him. I turn him over with my foot and his body rolls over in the dust. I gasp. God in Heaven. It’s Tommy!

I take him by his shoulder and shout his name. He’s limp and unresponsive—out cold. His face shines lurid in the moonlight, ghostly pale and covered in thick fat sweat. Dust coats his hair and settles into the fine lines of his face. Old dried vomit crusts his chest but I lay my head over it. He’s breathing but his breath comes shallow and slow. I check his pulse and it’s rapid—too rapid. I look him over and my blood ices. One of his pant legs is bloused to the knee and his leg is swollen twice its normal size. The flesh balloons over a makeshift tourniquet tied just below his knee. It can only mean one thing: a bite. A snake, a scorpion, or a lizard. Judging by his state, it could be fatal.

I try to rouse him but he won’t rouse. I pull-up his eyelids, and his eyes are glazed-over and dull with incomprehension. His pupils are huge. I call his name and slap his face. He slowly regains faint consciousness, his eyes casting the steady light of returning reason, but he doesn’t speak—he can’t speak—and he falls back unconscious.

I drag him to the house on his back through the dust. It’s a struggle. He’s very heavy. My whole body’s covered in sweat and dust by the time I get him inside, where I lay him on the floor in front of the fireplace. His clothes and boots are caked in fine powder from his long hard ride. His face is very pale and gray, and his lips are mottled blue. I light the oil lantern and turn the wick high. I inspect his wounded leg, covered in spots of blood right below the surface of the skin. I find the bite by its telltale X-shaped incision, barely visible through his ballooned flesh. The fang marks are long and sharp, and went very deep. A snake, no doubt. It’s midsummer, which means the venom’s at its most virulent. Better his leg than his arm since it’s further away from his heart but it still could be fatal, and judging by his condition, I don’t know if he’ll make it.

Last summer, a Native American peddler came through the valley on a big red Bay loaded down with clanging wares. We heard the clatter long before we saw him. Joel wanted to send him on his way but I had a good feeling about him so I invited him inside for a brew-up. He asked about our livestock and said he wanted to trade a sheep or a pig if we kept any, said he used sheep to cultivate antivenom and pigs for insulin. Since we had no pigs, we traded him one sheep for his antivenom—a small hard cake of concentrated yellowish powder hand-etched with a serpent symbol. We took him on his word and haven’t had to test its effectiveness but the time has come. It’d better work. It’d better.

I grab the cake from the cellar pantry beneath the kitchen floor where we store surplus grain, cured meat, and precious things like medicine. I scrape-off some of the powder and dissolve it into warm water. I fill the barrel of a hypodermic needle with the fluid, aim the needle into the fleshiest part of Tommy’s abdomen, and plunge it slow. Will it work? Were we scammed? A cold fear washes over me. What if the antivenom is actually poison and the man we brought it from was a psychopath? What if the antivenom kills him? Poisons him with an agonizing death. Oh, God, what have I done? Seized in nausea, I lay my head against his chest and slip my fingers against the pulse point beneath his jaw, watching and waiting.

Ten agonizing minutes pass and nothing changes. The peddler said to dose every fifteen minutes until the victim’s heartbeat returns to normal so I repeat the administration. Another ten minutes passes and nothing changes. I’m overcome with a sense of helplessness and anger at having been swindled by the peddler. Scammed for one of our precious sheep. Sheep are valuable and need constant vigilance, you know. The wolves carry them off with an insatiable taste for mutton. An entire goddamn sheep for a fake cure! He may as well have sold us one of those magic stones.

I glance at him, wondering what to do next, and he lids-up. His eyes are clouded and fixed. He looks at me. After an intense effort of trying to focus his eyes on me, his reasoning returns. “Ellie,” he says, his voice thin. He struggles to sit up but he can’t. He cries-out in pain and his body goes limp. I push back his hair and lay a hand over his sweaty forehead. “You’re safe now, Tommy.” He laughs at this, weak and grim. “I made it,” he says. “I got to you.” His eyes close and his breathing slips back to the steady cadence of deep sleep.


	20. Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty

Tommy finally roused on the second day of convalescence. We spent today like we spent yesterday and the day before. Fucking each other till we were totally fucked out. We tried everything, everywhere—the house, the stable, the sheds.

He’s recovering but he’s debilitated and his blood is still poisoned. His wound is healing but the skin around it’s swollen and ulcerated. The day he showed-up, his whole leg was dark red, almost purple. The flesh was puffed-up to the point of bursting and the skin around the tourniquet looked like two walls of angry flesh. I figured the bones below were broken from the pressure. I bled-out his wound thoroughly, and packed it with small bits of sterile cheesecloth and linen. I did a good job. There’s no sign of infection. 

The years have changed him. His face is thinner and sharper. His straw-colored hair’s shot through with grey around the temples and his muscles are rangier. But his eyes are the same—steady and serene—and he’s just as virile, willful, and quietly fearless as before. Boyish, reckless, and impetuous. He thought it was a dream—that I’d come to him in a dream—but it’s not the same for me. I always wished he’d come back but not like this. I shouldn’t have to see him like this—sick, wounded, and paralyzed near death. It’s not a nice thing to see someone you love sick like that. I want him to stick around but I wonder what’ll happen once Joel gets back. He always comes home at sundown with the big setting sun at his back. I suppose I won’t have to wait very long to find out because he’s supposed to be back today, by nightfall, and the sun’s just starting to set outside the windows. 

Tommy’s got one of my breasts in his mouth, licking and sucking my nipple. We’re on the couch playing with each other. I’m in his lap with my legs wrapped around him and my skirt hiked up to my waist. He kisses me all over—my eyes, my cheeks, my hair, and the back of my neck. We’re still madly attracted to each other but I don’t love him completely like I love Joel. Fact is, bodies grow old and wear out. So does desire. Passion rises and falls, and eventually dies. Joel and I share true love. An equal connection between our hearts and minds. An all-encompassing love. Tommy and I shared a deep passion that led to love but it wasn’t based on friendship so nothing goes deeper than our lust. When I fell for him in Jackson, it started as a crush. I was infatuated and obsessed with him. I talked myself into falling in love with him. It was my greatest ambition to fall in love and that’s what happened. I couldn’t separate my feelings from my needs. I thought he was the one—the one who completed me—but I’m able to live without him. We share a selfish love based on jealousy and possession. It’s not pure love. We can’t give into each other’s needs gracefully like I do with Joel. For you, I’ll do anything, is what I always think to myself when he asks me for anything, no matter what.

Above my little gasps of pleasure comes the sound of distant thrumming. I hold onto Tommy and tell him to be quiet so I can listen. It’s the far-off thrumming of a galloping horse. The hooves aren’t hasty or urgent. It must be Joel returning home on Honor. It has to be him. My heart skips a beat. Of course it’s him! I get up from the couch, groom my hair and clothes into order, and step into my moose-hide moccasins. I grab my rifle and tell Tommy to stay put. I want to handle Joel by myself. A while back, I had told him about Tommy’s first visit with his Hell’s Rangers and he didn’t believe me. He laughed at me and said it must’ve been my vivid imagination. I didn’t bother correcting him because he wouldn’t listen. Well, he’s about to learn it wasn’t my imagination. This is real. This is happening.

I step out onto the veranda and look out across the flat. The setting sun casts a rider on a horse in steady approach, enveloped in a yellowish-black dust cloud. My heart skips a beat. It’s Joel’s familiar silhouette and Honor’s cadence. Honor draws down to a walk and halts in front of the house. Joel dismounts and ties him to a hitch ring at the first column. The only sound is Honor’s labored breath and the creak of the saddle. The way Joel moves tells me he’s weary and stiff. He should be after such a far trip. He’s ridden long and hard, probably up to fifty miles a day, climbing in and out of steep canyons. He’s getting old. Six days of sleeping on the cold hard ground would be backbreaking for anyone his age. But he’s got a harassed look on his face. His lips curve downwards. His mood should be cheerful. Cheerful because there’s an enormous bag draped crosswise over Honor’s croup. It’s a magnificent elk. A bull with kingly antlers. He should be pleased to have bagged such a glorious beast but his expression’s blank. He gives nothing away.

I wait for him to say something like, ‘Well, Ellie, I’ve gone to Silvergrass Mountain and I’m back. What’s new?’ Or, ‘Look, Ellie, I just rode over a hundred miles of rough country and I ain’t in a good mood. Pitch in or step aside.’ Instead, he looks at me directly and says, “Who’s here, Ellie?” So he knows. So what? Why should I feel guilty about it? What is it about his manner that always makes me feel like I’m doing something wrong? I wasn’t trying to hide anything from him. I tried to tell him about Tommy but he wouldn’t listen. Maybe he saw Tommy’s horse’s hooves in the dust or the trail of his body in the ground from when I dragged him inside. We can go half-a-year without seeing any horse hooves or wheel tracks within miles of our cabin. Knowing Joel, he probably saw nothing at all and simply felt it in his gut. You can’t get anything past him. Don’t even try it. “Come inside,” I say.

“Who’s here?” he asks.

“Come inside.”

“I’m wanting to know and I’m gonna know, Ellie. You’re telling me right now.”

“It’s your brother,” I say. He doesn’t respond but I sense his muscles stiffening-up. “Tommy’s here,” I add.

“Who?” he asks, baffled. “Who’s here?”

“Tommy.”

“Tommy?” His face is colorless. His eyes are wide. “Here? Now?”

“Tommy’s here. Right now. He got bit.” I realize how alarming this sounds so I add, “Not that kind of bit.” He pushes past me through the front door and comes to an abrupt stop in front of the pegs where Tommy’s load-out hangs. He looks at Tommy’s bandolier cartridge belts and ammo belts as if he’s looking at a strange alien thing. When he’s done looking, he swivels his head around the room till he spots his brother standing by the large fireplace in the open living room. They stare at each other across the distance, neither of them speaking nor moving.

Tommy’s eyes are alert and serene. His manner is calm, patient, and composed without violence or swagger. He’s willing to wait for his brother’s reaction. Joel’s muscles are stiff, and his breath is heavy and strained. His eyes look bewildered but they broadcast no anger. If he wants to fight with his brother, he’s not going to force it. Forehead deeply furrowed, he walks over to Tommy. First he walks to his left side and studies his face in profile, and then he walks to his right side and does the same thing. “It can’t be you,” he says.

“It’s me, brother,” Tommy answers, “and I ain’t as damned near dead as you thought I was!” He extends his hand for a handshake with the flat of his palm wide open. Joel doesn’t move nor speak. “Don’t worry, brother,” Tommy says with a laugh. “I ain’t gonna kill you. I never kill nobody unless I’m getting paid to do it.” Joel takes his hand and they shake momentarily until Tommy pulls him into a warm embrace. They hug and slap each other across the back. After a bit, they separate and stare at each other with twitching smiles. “So you came at last,” Joel says.

“I got here,” Tommy says.

“You got out.”

“I got out.”

“Maria?”

“I reckon she’s still there, buried under the mud.”

“I don’t mind admitting I was keeping an eye open,” Joel says. I can tell he doesn’t want to say too much. His manner’s constrained and his behavior’s bland and courteous. Tommy’s manner is genuine. He’s perfectly at ease and confident. “How many years?” he asks Joel.

“So many,” Joel says. “You handled the wash-out.”

“I’m here, ain’t I?” he says and glances around the house. “You found a nice place for yourself. How long have you been here?”

“Not a hell of a while.”

“Looks like years.”

“You’ll stay a piece?” Joel asks.

“I might could,” Tommy says.

“What are you doing so far this way?”

“I reckon I’ve got some explaining to do about that. I got my temper mixed-up with a pit viper, got caught on the wrong side of Devil’s Canyon. If I’d have crossed, we would’ve never met. It was fate.”

“I reckon,” Joel says. Neither man moves nor speaks. I suppose the two of them would stand there looking at each other till they turned into skeletons so I break the silence and say, “That elk’s not getting any fresher.” They graciously take my cue and head outside to retrieve the elk.


	21. Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-One

I head to the courtyard where I prepare a workbench for the field dressing of the elk, lit by oil lamps. The courtyard is my favorite part of the house. On clear nights sometimes we sleep out here. It’s not that the house is uncomfortable—not with our thick adobe walls and smooth spruce floors. The thing is, we spent so much time sleeping outdoors while we were drifting that sometimes the walls of the house feel oppressive. Sometimes we just prefer to be outside among the flickering stars and the fresh bracing air without feeling like we’re shut in.

After I prepare the courtyard, I go stable Honor, and after that, I head to my bedroom to freshen-up. Joel let me have the bigger of the two. It has a wide and high bedstead built into the wall, small high square windows, and a narrow door opening onto the courtyard, which is where Tommy and Joel are busy field dressing the elk. I know this because the door’s ajar and I can hear everything they’re saying. Joel’s telling Tommy how he bagged the bull while coming down the West Fork of Silvergrass Mountain. How his first shot went wild but he couldn’t find his bullet nor hear the elk run. How the chase ended in thick spruce timber where he found the bull resting, crippled by his shot through the left hind leg. I know I shouldn’t eavesdrop. I’m sure I’ll hear the same story from Joel many times in many different versions till he goes on his next solo scout. It’s wrong to eavesdrop, I tell myself, even when people are speaking about boring things like bagging game. I know this but I still can’t help myself! For all they know, I’m out back, stabling Honor, so I sit on my bed and listen to Tommy tell Joel all about his run-in with the snake.

“So you had a brush with a rattler,” Joel begins.

“Just a little scratch,” Tommy laughs.

“How’d it happen?”

“Well, it’s like this. Long about a week ago, I was riding the rocky uplands quite a piece up the basin. Devil’s Canyon.”

“You know what they say about Devil’s Canyon,” Joel says. “Don’t trust your eyes or your ears. Folks go in and never find their way out.”

“A good place to keep out of,” Tommy says with a laugh. “I stopped to take a leak and heard the rasp of his thick scales. It was a diamond back. I felt his fangs go right into my leg. I tore him off and killed him cold. My leg started burning and stinging like the devil. I got dizzy and my mind started going, and then my muscles started to lock-up. I got to my horse but I fell to my knees. It took a powerful lotta effort to get one leg up over the saddle and it took another big effort to lash myself in. Then I went blind and figured I was a goner. I would’ve died without her help.”

“And my antivenom,” Joel adds.

“She’s grown a lot since I saw her last,” Tommy says.

“It appears like.”

“Time’s made a young woman outta her. Do you ever wonder if she’d leave you?”

“Leave me?” Joel scoffs. “Ellie? Not her. She’d never leave me.”

“What if she wanted to get married?”

“Who’s she gonna marry?”

“It could happen.”

“He’d have to move in with us,” Joel jokes.

“She’s a pretty girl. You can’t stop men from admiring her. It could happen.”

“I’ll worry about it when it happens,” Joel says. They go quiet for a bit, followed by the soft wet sounds of elk guts plopping into the big tin basins, till Joel picks up the conversation and says, “I thought you lost that trick. I was hoping you got out safe.”

“I always land somewhere,” Tommy answers.

“What in blazes have you been up to?”

“I found a nice place up in Montana Territory. What a hell of a country. A good place. Good folks. But I didn’t like Montana Territory. Mistakes were made—we all make ’em sooner or later. I made a mistake in Bozeman. I got too friendly with one of ’em. I drank too much and got loose with my talk. She was a looker—a tight dress that showed-off all her charms. Name of Kaylynn. Said she was left alone too much and women ain’t exactly gentle when they’re left alone too much, yeah? I pounded hell for leather and fanned it back south. She sent word she couldn’t bear to see me leave so suddenly.”

The blood drains from my face and my hands tremble. So Tommy’s been unfaithful. I shouldn’t be surprised. He likes to get himself a nice young girl and tell her pretty little lies. Seduce her. Make a bad girl out of her. It’s the game he plays. He played it with me and I played it with him voluntarily but the thought of him playing it was someone else—someone named Kaylynn—makes my blood boil. I think of all the pretty little lies he told me the last time he was here, like I was the only one for him, like he wanted me to be his wife. And I was stupid enough to believe him. God, I’m such an idiot! The cold shock turns into throbbing anger and I feel the blood rush back into my face. If I didn’t want to hear more, I’d rush in there and kick him square in the balls—bite him and scratch him and pinch him.

“Women always hold onto the ones they love,” Joel says. “You know how they are.”

“Well, she’s wasting her breath,” Tommy says.

“One of these days,” Joel says, “the right woman’ll be waiting for you.”

“I don’t try to figure ’em out no more,” Tommy says. “I just fuck ’em. It saves a whole lotta effort. You can fuck someone in twenty minutes or you can spend twenty minutes trying to talk to ’em. It ain’t worth the time. I’ve been all over the country since then. Something told me I oughta move around—something in the wind—and now I’m here. I reckon you ain’t too interested in all that’s happened between here and Jackson so I’m telling you this ‘cause it’s a small world. You can’t deny it. It ain’t so big the that three of us can’t meet-up like this. Our trails led us right here.”

“I don’t see what you’re getting at,” Joel says.

“Trails lead all over the place. Fate sets ’em down. Some of ’em lead you into trouble and others lead you into success. Some to fortune, some to defeat. Straight trails, crooked trails, hard trails, easy trails. You might start-out on one that’s clear as day but pretty soon it crosses one that’s menacing with a crooked rider riding on it. The straight man and the crooked man meet at the crossroads, and before they go any further, there’s gotta be a reckoning.”

“You’ve sure got me guessing, brother,” Joel says, his voice clipped and bitter. “You’re either calling me a saint or a devil.”

“I ain’t claiming nothing,” Tommy says. “We’re at the crossroads. That’s what’s doing right here.”

“You’re wanting an explanation of what happened that night, I suppose?” Joel sneers. My muscles gather up at the aggressive tone of his voice, ready to rush into the courtyard to diffuse the tension. I don’t want a fight between them. Their reunion should be a celebration. “If you’re claiming to be the straight rider on the straight trail,” Tommy continues, “I reckon you’ve got some explaining to do.”

“Do you remember that night, Tommy, or do I need to remind you?” Joel asks, his voice venomous.

“That’s no way to treat your brother, Joel. I was hoping we’d be able to get along.”

“I ain’t worried one bit about it,” Joel says, his tone relenting. “It doesn’t mean nothing to me.”

“Nor to me, either. Don’t go twisting my words. I came here to clear-up all our misunderstandings and to start fresh on good terms. Our trails have crossed for that reason and for that reason alone.”

“Good terms meaning what?”

“It shapes-up like this,” Tommy says with a bit of excitement in his voice. “I ride. I ride with a gun and a gang. The Hell’s Rangers.”

“I’ve heard that,” Joel answers.

“Meaning Ellie told you?”

“I reckon I’m meaning that.”

“We merc ’em up and take what we want. Bust ’em wide open—raiders, rustlers, black marketers. We shoot hard and fast. If a fella gets a bullet in his back, it’s his fault he ain’t facing you. We do a little bit of everything. Gun fighting, thieving, and bounty hunting. I reckon I could use some help.”

“I never knew a time when you needed help, Tommy.”

“A man can’t always have his eyes everywhere. You tied up anywhere?”

“It’s been a while since I’ve had a regular job.”

“I need a man who’s got a cool hand and steady nerves.”

“I’m wanting a free hand in all things,” Joel says. “No boss over me. I’mma do as I please without asking nobody, and I’mma come and go as I please. Drifting out here was an end to all that.”

“We ain’t arguing that. Are you interested?”

“What’s your proposition?” Joel asks.

“I aim to run my gang with men I can depend on. I don’t recruit cowards—men who run from trouble. You have to wanna stay and fight. We’ve got a hang-out of sorts. A home base: the Narrows—heaven on earth—and I need a foreman. In exchange, you get protection, brotherhood, and whatever you can carry off.”

“That don’t interest me none—”

“Wait till I finish,” Tommy says, interrupting him. “You get protection and whatever you can carry off—horses, cattle, hides, turquoise, gold, oil, weapons, food, medicine, tobacco, women—and killing under the protection of the law.”

“What kinda protection?”

“Justiceing business. Vigilantes wanting to fill up their jails. We’ve got friends in high places who settle things the easiest way when we find ourselves on the wrong side of the law. They’ll pack the juries and obstruct justice. Those kinds of things. Sometimes we’re given police powers, acting as peace officers, so any killings we do won’t get officially investigated. No court orders issued against us unless we do something so openly flagrant, it’d demand legal interference.”

My limbs tremble and I burn-up with rage. Leave him alone, I yell silently to Tommy. Keep Joel out of this! He’d never join you and your bandits! He’d never choose you over me! He’s built a beautiful home, and cultivated the land with his own hands and know-how, without anyone’s help. Don’t you dare ask him to leave it all behind for things he doesn’t want or need. How dare you ask him to leave me behind for your outlaws! How dare you put a target on his back! Joel’s getting old. He’s not as fast or tough as he used to be. That’s what I’m here for—to take care of him. He needs to be here with me, not out there running around with fugitives, shooting men in the back.

“Care to cast your lot with us?” Tommy asks.

“Can you put that in writing?” Joel asks.

“Whenever you want.”

“I’ve gotta do some thinking about that.”

“It’s your choice to make.”


	22. Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Two

Choose the right thing, Joel, I beg him silently. Tell Tommy and his outlaws to go to hell. You’re an honest man and you’re going to stay honest. Tell him to get out of this house and to stay out. Leave us alone! I hear the unmistakable sound of Tommy and Joel pounding each other on the back, the way big men finish a handshake of good intent. So there it is. Joel’s made his choice. Tommy over me.

“Where’ll we go?” Joel asks.

“Borders are always good,” Tommy says.

“When do we leave?”

“Any time’s good,” Tommy says and every bone in my body screams. I can’t just sit here and pretend nothing happened, so I storm into the courtyard and face them square, my whole body quivering anger. “So that’s it, huh?” I yell. Their faces are surprised with a hint of guilt and suspicion in their eyes. “You’re interrupting something private here, Ellie,” Joel says so I say to him, “You’re just gonna run off and leave me? Leave everything you’ve built?”

“I reckon that’s all, Ellie,” he commands, trying to shut me down. “Robbing honest people and stealing horses?” I yell at them. “What kinda life’s that? Always looking for trouble, always looking for a fight. Grabbing-up anything you can get your greedy hands on. There’s more important things than that! There’s peace and quiet!” I turn to Joel and address him directly, “If you’ve got any sense left in your head, you stay away from Tommy and his riders! He’s gonna get you killed!” He doesn’t respond. His face is pale and his eyes are shifty, so I turn to Tommy and address him directly, “What’s wrong with you? Putting a target on his back? Your own brother! Why not just kill him now before he gets himself killed? Tommy, I swear to God—leave him alone! You and your outlaws can go to hell!” He doesn’t respond, just looks at me with a half-sneering grin. “Well?” I yell at him. “What are you waiting for? Are you gonna kill him or not?”

“This has gone far enough, Ellie,” Joel says. “Tell him to leave us alone!” I yell back at him, meaning Tommy. No one speaks nor moves for a moment till Joel breaks the silence and says, “It’s been a long hard trail, Ellie. Sometimes I couldn’t see the end of it. This ain’t it.”

“This is your home!” I yell, incredulous. “It’s where you belong!”

“Something leads me.”

“You belong here! With me!”

“If you think you can change me, I’m sorry, you’re gonna be mighty disappointed.”

“I can’t change you, Joel, but you could change yourself if you weren’t such an asshole!”

“You can go on thinking that but you’re just gonna end-up hurting yourself.”

“Coward!” I yell. “Both of you! Running off like that! Do you think it’s gonna kill-off the bad memories? Do you think you’ll sleep better at night, wearing yourselves out?”

“Tommy Miller sleeps fine,” Tommy says and thumps his chest for emphasis.

“Well, Joel Miller doesn’t!” I yell. “He doesn’t sleep!”

“I reckon he’s just a restless old sonofabitch,” Tommy says with a laugh. Laughing at a time like this! I know what they’re doing. They’re trying to wash away one crime with another, a crime committed in the name of justice or country or brotherhood, or whatever else they can trick themselves into blaming it on. Fact is, I've seen Joel at night in front of the fire, lying in his chair, twisting and turning, tormented by his memories, trying to wash the blood off of his hands.

I’m overcome by a sense of futility and hopelessness. I give up. I’m tired of giving my heart over to the people I love only to suffer their absence and betrayal. Why does everyone I love leave me? Am I unlovable? Is there something in my manner that turns people off? I make a desperate little sob and say, “Go ahead, Joel,” my voice and manner resigned. “Take Honor. Take your guns. Take your gear and go. You’ll need all of it. Go ahead and leave. Keep stoking the fire of revenge. Keep stoking your anger and rage till it consumes you completely or gets you killed. Don’t worry about me! Don’t even think about me!” I run back into my room, trembling in the darkness. No one comes after me. No one cares. Realizing my words have no effect on either of them, I start to sob impotent futile tears. I’m desperate to drive-in my point but how can I do it? I’ll run away, I think to myself. Hole-up in the mountains. They won’t be able to find me and it’ll strike fear into their hearts. No, I decide. I’m too old to be running off when things don’t go my way. Maybe I could maim their horses so they’d have no choice but to stay? That won’t work, either. I’m not some psycho who goes around hurting animals.

Something else comes to me and I decide to act on it. I go to the front door, and grab Joel’s ammo belts and his leather holster belt hanging from the pegs. I head back into the courtyard and toss them down at his feet. They slam into the dust, and the cartridges and shells tinkle as they scatter. This sound brings me great satisfaction. I know it’s childish. I know it’s impulsive and hot-headed but it’s the best thing I can think of so I go back into the house, grab Joel’s fighting load carrier vest, go back to the courtyard, and slam it down at his feet again. The ammo flings from the pouches and rolls away in the dust. Good! Joel grabs an oil lantern and starts plucking his scattered ammo from the ground, cursing under his breath. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Joel!” I yell. “You’d better! ‘Cause if you don’t, Tommy’s gonna get you killed!”

Joel looks at me directly with great annoyance in his eyes and says, “You’re still here, yeah?”

“She’s still here, alright,” Tommy says, “and still being a damn nuisance!” He laughs freely and a moment later, Joel’s shoulders shake with silent laughter. “Don’t tell me she’s bothering you, too, Joel!” Tommy says, laughing. I make a little giggle at this. I can’t help it. I try to hide my laughter behind my knuckles but I can’t so I laugh freely with them. Joel comes over and pulls me into a hug. I’m overwhelmed by a feeling of great gentleness and tenderness toward him. I regret acting-out. I’m ashamed of my temper. Fact is, Joel’s yearning to get back into the game. Bounty hunting and black marketing. It’s the first time in decades he hasn’t had a price on his head and I suppose he misses the thrill. Back in Texas, hide-hunting with Tommy. Back in Boston, running the Black with Tess. Back in Jackson, laying low from bounty hunters. I know his decision to join Tommy has nothing to do with me. He simply gets restless. I try to keep-up his spirits but I know he’s bored out here. I know he finds domestic life monotonous. He’s looking for something physical and Tommy’s the most trustworthy loyal wingman he could ask for. The foreman position is a perfect match for his character, authority, and skill. I should feel good about this but I don’t. All I can think about is he’s leaving me for Tommy’s selfish proposition. And Tommy knows how much Joel means to me but he doesn’t care about my feelings.

I hold onto Joel very tight and listen to his heart thumping in his chest. He digs around my hair and pushes it from my face, and says, “We spent a lotta time out there, you and me, yeah? Pounding dirt from all ’em hunters. Soon enough I started to realize I wasn’t as much afraid of them getting to me and you as I was of them taking you away from me. Maybe at one point I was ready to hand you over to whoever would take you offa my hands but I’d had you too long. I cared for you too much. One day I woke up and realized I wanted to be someone you could look up to and think as much about me as I do you.” He leads me from his chest and looks at me directly. “Ellie, I’m running straight. I haven’t done a lowdown thing in a long time. Nothing’s gonna change that. I want you to be proud of me.”

“I am,” I tell him and he says, “I don’t want all those things I built-up to crumble to the ground. I don’t wanna lose you.”

“You won’t.”

“I’m banking on you being able to take care of yourself while I’m gone.”

“You know I can.”

“I’ve gotta do what’s best. You know it calls me.”

“I trust you,” I say.

“You’ll trust him more once you meet my boys,” Tommy says. “I don’t care about your boys,” I answer, my voice acidic. Haven’t you and your boys done enough harm already, I ask him silently. Leave us alone and tell your boys the same. Stay away from us and don’t ever come back! I always wished Tommy would come back but now I wish he’d just stayed away. Why the hell didn’t he just stay away? Why’d he have to come back here and ruin everything? “What’s possessing you?” he asks.

“It would’ve served you right if that snake killed you,” I say and he laughs freely at this, and says, “Let a man go patting himself on the back and here comes a woman to knock it straight outta him!”

“Why’d you even ask me?” I ask.

“To see if you’d be as difficult as always.”

“I’m no different than always.”

“Age’s driven the spirit outta you, Ellie. Reckon my boys’ll help drive it back in. We’ll have the chance tonight, it seems like.” Joel and I look at each other, baffled. “They oughta be here by moon rise,” Tommy continues. “I’ll be awful glad for you to meet ’em.” What? What’s this? His men are coming here? Now? To the house? Tommy wipes his hands on a rag and says, “How about giving ’em a warm welcome?”


	23. Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Three

Tommy leans against a veranda column and looks out over the flat. Joel’s on one of the benches with his arms crossed over his chest. Chilled air sweeps across the serene valley, silent, dark, and still. “What kinda men are they?” Joel asks Tommy, meaning his riders, and Tommy answers, “You’ll find out soon enough.”

“Capable?”

“They’re tough,” Tommy says. “They don’t mess around and I expect the same’ll go with you. Give 'em a couple weeks. They’ve all heard about you. Your reputation. They’ll be curious. Some’ll be reserved and some’ll be doubtful but I reckon you won’t leave ’em with much doubt. They’ve just gotta be shown. Most are outlaws. Fugitives from the law. All of ’em are free men and every man’s a fighter. They’ll bend but they won’t break. They can and do carry guns. You’ll know your doubters soon enough. Don’t rise to ’em and don’t let ’em rile you up. You’ll have a couple who’ll be jealous, thinking they can match you, eager to have it out, so keep your eyes peeled. You’ll always be able to catch ’em working themselves up to it. You’ll have to be slick.” He gestures at the horizon and announces, “They’re coming now, it seems like.” I follow his gaze but I don't see any signs of movement so I ask him, “Where?” And he says, “There’s horses out there. About a dozen, coming-in like hell! I hope no one’s chasing ’em!”

Faintly outlined against the dark sky, a travelling dust cloud coalesces on a high mountain ridge and silently slides down the slope. A breeze stirs and carries the distant rolling thunder of horse hooves. The dust cloud turns east and heads straight toward us, the sound receding as it disappears behind a small ledge. It reappears and I can make-out the horses, bunched like cavalry, streaming across the flat. Some riders wave their Stetsons as they approach, their wild voices whooping and hollering above the riot of hooves. They draw down to a walk in the smooth strides of skilled riders, and halt in front of the house in a riot of billowing dust and clattering hooves.

The riders are the same wild virile deeply-bronzed men who escorted Tommy here before. They sit tall and loose in their saddles. They pull down their shemaghs to faces bristled in week-old stubbled beards. They’ve ridden long hard miles to get here and trekked many miles over grim burnt-out country. You can see it in their dust-caked clothes, their battered Stetsons, and their boot insets almost worn-through from the stirrups. They dismount their tall horses to a chorus of jingling bit rings and long spurs, and slide lithely to the ground. They draw their reins beneath their arms or toss them over their horses’ necks. The distinct smell of leather and horse sweat drifts the wind. The only sound comes from the horses—the scuff of their hooves, the creak of leather saddles, and the huff of lungs.

Outfits like Tommy’s Hell’s Rangers are unique. Fact is, the country’s full of vagrant bands of desperados and wild men. Gangs of riders who rove the country looking for trouble. But unlike the Hell’s Rangers, those other gangs are made-up of ignorant dirty drunk renegade bastards who are coarse, crude, and uncouth. Thieves looking for any excuse to kill. Gaunt, hungry, and hunted. Wanted men drift into their outfits, work until they get bored or double-crossed, and drift away. Most don’t even go by their real names.

Tommy’s riders are hand-picked. He only recruits civilized men. They’re wild but considerate and well-mannered. Loyal, dedicated, and faithful. They’d back each other to Hell’s gates. Their horses are tall, strong, and well-bred. Every saddle fits perfectly, set with multiple upmarket assault rifles. Ammo is abundant and worn on cartridge bandoliers crossed over their deep wide chests and in ammo belts slung around their slim strong waists. Tommy stands in front of them with his legs asprawl and his thumbs hooked into his hip-slung cartridge belts. His manner’s calm and authoritative. Joel echoes his posture, standing one step behind him. “I was wondering if y’all were coming,” Tommy says to the riders. “Glad to see y’all made it.”

“We got here as soon as we could, Chief,” a rider says and Tommy asks, “Where’s Wiley? Red Ross and Sweetwater? They’re still with us?”

“They stayed back, Chief,” the rider says.

“Ran into trouble out yonder?” he asks.

“Hell’s heat,” the rider says with a laugh. “They were forced to ride back north a-ways and settle it. Just a little ruckus.”

“Nothing new?”

“We were waiting to show up.”

“Seen any other riders around?”

“Reno Cruz is dead, Chief,” another rider says and gestures at a large motionless body slung crossways over the back of his horse. “So you got him,” Tommy says with a satisfied smile. He walks through the riders and inspects the body laid over the horse’s hindquarters. “That’s him, alright,” he says. “I saw that sonofabitch fanning around Great Falls last winter on that big black horse of his, rustling-up strays. Said he was out hunting deer. Told him if he pulled-off anything like that again, we’d come right back at him.”

“Caught him red handed, Chief,” the rider says. “It was a Flying Ace horse he rode. Branded on the ribs. We dragged him out and swung him. He bounced around a bit, by the looks of it.”

“Reckon it don’t make much of a difference to Cruz no more,” Tommy says with a laugh and the rider continues, “Picked him up at the head of the Bronco River. On Pitchfork trail. Took him to Hangman’s Rock.”

“And his men?” Tommy asks.

“No sign of ’em.”

“That other rustler who calls himself Taylor? The big fella who was driving the band of stolen horses into Idaho from Montana?”

“Nobody’s seen him.”

“We’ll cross him again,” Tommy says. “When it happens, we’ll settle things. Did he steal the horses on his own hook? Or he bought them from Doyle?”

“He didn’t say, said he’d swing either way,” the rider says, and Tommy laughs and says, “We sure accommodated him!” He walks back to Joel’s side, drops a hand over his shoulder, and says, “Boys, I want y’all to meet someone. Joel Miller. This here’s your new boss. He’s accepted my invitation to throw in with us.” Joel stands motionless, watching the riders with steady alert eyes. The riders exchange nervous glances but their faces are eager. Some throw suspicious glances and some look curious. “He’s on the same footing as me,” Tommy continues. “Nothing less. We split everything two ways with you boys taking your regular share after we take ours. That’s straight talk. Y’all can take it or leave it.”

It’s clear no one’s going to object. Why would they? They listen with great respect to Tommy when he speaks and they compete for his attention. I know it’ll be the same with Joel. They’ll accept him and be eager to take his orders. He’s the perfect leader of these kinds of men. Fearless, inflexible, fair, and strong. “Now, let’s get this straight,” Tommy says. “He’s running things for you boys now. He’ll treat you boys right and y’all’ll be pleased to know it means I’ll be interfering less.” The men laugh good-naturedly at this. Joel clears his throat and says to the men, “Y’all are welcome here. You come and go as you please, and stay as long as you please. No questions asked.” Tommy addresses them, “It’s been a long hard ride and y’all have got faces that’d scare-off the Devil! Go string up 'em horses. When you’re done, come up outta the dust, and corral in the courtyard for a knock-down and a wash-up. Then we’ll get to grubbing. Pile out!” With their long spurs jangling, the riders swagger-off to make an improvised corral of rope stretched around the trees where the horses will be unsaddled, unbridled, watered, fed, and turned-out.

I head inside and boil large pots of water on the wood stove for their wash-up. I set-up a washing station in the courtyard with towels, soap, brushes, combs, mirrors, scissors, and razors. Joel hauls our big tin bathtub into the courtyard where the riders stand around laughing and chatting. They’re in high spirits despite the long hard ride. I imagine they’re parched and hungry. They’ve likely slept very little and any sleeping was done on the hard ground. They probably ate cold food in the saddle the whole time. I’m sure their stomachs are ready for a good hot meal.

They unbuckle their bandoliers, cartridge belts, and holsters, and lay them over the workbenches. Some wear chaps, which they unstrap and hang from hitch rings on the spruce colonnade circling the courtyard. They strip naked to their waists, take off their boots, and walk around barefoot in the dust with the swagger of men who’ve spent their lives in the saddle. They’re all tall, broad-shouldered, and slim-waisted. Tommy goes down the line, and makes introductions to me and Joel. There’s Sureshot Strell, Pastor Garcia, Dakota Lewis, Big Drexel, Tacoma Brill, Iron Rogers, Slim Tully, Sundown Torres, and Justice Johnson. They tip their Stetsons and murmur, ‘Ma’am,’ at me with polite smiles, and I greet them back. Some look away while others self-consciously finger the brims of their hats. I get the feeling they’re not used to being around women.

Tommy introduces me to Justice Johnson and my heart skips a beat. He takes-off his Stetson and bows low, the brim sweeping the ground. Beneath his hat, his thick brown hair’s tangled, tousled, and damp with sweat. “Mighty glad to meet you, ma’am,” he says. His face is worn in sun and weather, and his eyes sparkle with good humor. His voice is low and rumbling, matched to his size. He smiles wide. He’s got big white teeth and a big square jaw. Despite his largeness, there’s something clean and wholesome about him. Even without his boots, he towers over Joel.

After introductions, the men call out to each other while they wait for their turns to bathe. Some polish their boots and well-worn chaps with brushes and rags, and others spark corn husk cigarettes and pipes. Tommy mills around and chats with them. He pats Drexel on the belly as he passes-by and says, “Look at that! A nice warm blanket for a lady on a cold winter night!” Picturing this is very funny. Drexel’s big but he’s all muscle and no fat. The men laugh but I don’t. I’m thinking very black thoughts about Tommy, gripped by cold jealousy when I hear his voice or look at him. Fucking other women! Women named Kaylynn! I suppose his invitation for Joel to join his outfit was vindictive and spiteful. I suppose he’s jealous of the beautiful home we’ve built together, and he wants to sabotage it. I don’t like thinking this but it’s how I feel and I want to hurt him back. I know him well enough that the best way to hurt him is to injure his vanity and inflame his jealousy, and I see my chance with Justice. Justice could make two out of him. He’s as big as a Redwood and as strong as a bull.

I watch him as he waits to bathe, laughing and chatting with the other riders. When his turn comes, he takes-off his Stetson, the imprint of his hatband scored deep into his sweaty hair, and he tosses it onto the workbench with the others. He bends over the tub and starts to scrubs himself down. The bulging muscles of his deep chest are covered in dark thick curls. I know I shouldn’t stare but I can’t help myself. He looks like a bullwhacker. He’s the biggest man I’ve ever seen. He moves in a big slow muscular way that matches his manner and physique. When he finishes, I go over to him with a towel as he buckles on his cartridge belt sagged with large-handled .357 Magnum revolvers. I look around the courtyard to see if Tommy notices. He’s standing around, chatting with a group of riders, but he’s watching me. Of course he’s watching me! Nothing gets by him. Our eyes connect and I can see all the questions he wants to ask me. I smile at him, cruel and cold. Watch me, Tommy, I say to him silently. Watch me make a fool out of you. Watch me take you down a peg. Watch me hurt you like you hurt me. I hope Kaylynn in Bozeman was worth it.

I hand Justice a towel and ask, “Justice, right?” He takes it from me with an appreciative smile and wipes the water from his chest. His eyes are sharp, clear, and blue against his deeply tanned skin. His hands are big, fleshy, and square. These aren't the hands of a skilled gunslinger. They’re bad for gun play. “This side of the line, my name’s Justice, ma’am,” he says. “I hope you haven’t heard about my reputation.”

“What reputation?” I ask and he says, “I reckon a girl like you ain’t gonna throw herself at an outlaw like me.”

“I’m sure your reputation isn’t as bad as people make it out to be.”

“You reckon I’m on the level?”

“From what I’ve seen, you’re the perfect gentleman.”

“Damned if I ain’t starting to believe it myself!” he says and laughs good-naturedly. “I’mma have to prove it to you, though. That is, if you’ll let me.” We share a warm smile at this. I want to get to know him but I won’t have the chance now because Tommy’s shrill whistle breaks over the courtyard, interrupting us. Look Here and Listen, this whistle says. The men go quiet and look to him for tasking. He tells them to shuck on their clothes and head out front to make a cooking fire for the elk. They buckle-on their cartridge belts and holsters, and exit the courtyard with their long spurs jangling. I gather a load of used towels and start to head inside. Tommy stands in the doorway waiting for me. He looks agitated and harassed, and I note this with great satisfaction. He’s not going to let me pass by without a word. This is clear. I decide I’ll treat him with formal politeness despite my anger. I come into earshot and he asks, “I reckon you met my boy Johnson?”

“You know better than to ask me that,” I say. “You were standing right there.”

“You’re right. I seen it myself. I’m letting you know I’ve got my eyes open.”

“So you got an eyeful, huh?” I say in a taunting tone and he doesn’t like this because he says, “Now listen here, Ellie. You know better than to get mixed up with my boys. You don’t know who he is or where he comes from.”

“His name’s Justice. And I like him.”

He scoffs and says, “What do you know about that kinda thing? Look at you. A girl of eighteen. You’re just a girl!”

“I’m just a girl but I know what I want. I want him.”

“You know nothing about that kinda stuff,” he says and I say, “I know you, and you’re wrong! You’d better not say anything to him or anyone else. I’m warning you.” “You’re warning me?” he says with a snide laugh. “Those are my boys, and I’mma do and say as I please.”

“Not to him.”

“What are you gonna do to stop me?” he asks and I say, “Nothing. But he might. He could make two outta you. He’s more man than you.”

“Meaning?”

“Kaylynn in Bozeman?” I ask, and he sneers and says, “Keeping track, yeah?” “I’m not keeping track,” I say. “I didn’t even know where you were!”

“I reckon at the time you weren’t looking for me, either.”

“Do you love her?” I ask and he says, “I thought I did.” I scoff at this and say, “You don’t even know if you love her or not?”

“I suppose so.”

“So you love her and you snuck-off? What kinda man sneaks-off on a woman he loves?”

“Depends on your thinking.”

“Stop with the double-talk!”

“There’s hell in you tonight, Ellie,” he says and I snap back, “There’s always been.”

“You stay away from Johnson, you hear me? I had some trouble with him not too long ago and I had to speak to him pretty plain. He’s a handsome fella, the type you’d find in the old magazines modelling clothes. He’ll flash that nice smile but he’s hiding a whole lotta trouble behind it. He’s got some good points but more bad than good.”

“If he’s so bad, why don’t you fire him?” I ask and he says, “He’s one of my best men. It’d damn near cripple this outfit.”

“Then figure it out yourself! It’s not my problem.”

“Whatever he’s saying to you, he’s just flattering you. As for the rest of ’em fellas, they’re married men. With wives and families.” He’s lying! He’d never allow a married man to join his outfit. It’s an unwritten rule. Bands of outlaws would never allow it. The risk of leaving behind a widow and orphans is too great. I call him out, saying, “Married men can’t ride with you!” He continues speaking as if he hadn’t heard me, saying, “There are a couple young fellas here who think they’re slick and they’re looking to impress women. Is that clear?”

“What’d you come back here for, Tommy? Me or Joel?” “I came for you,” he says, his voice soft. “I made a mistake leaving you last time like I did. I was falling in love and I was scared of what was gonna happen. I realize that now. I didn’t come back sooner ‘cause I didn’t know what to say to you.” I don’t believe him. I think he’s lying. As long as I’ve known him, he’s never been at a loss for words, so I tell him, “You’ve never been tongue-tied in your life!”

“You know I say what I mean. You’re my girl. I picked you and I aim to have you, and if anyone gets in my way, I’mma kill ‘em. One day I’ll carry you off. It’ll come to that someday. But today’s not the day. We’re gonna forget it now.”

“You can’t do anything to stop me.”

“There are some ways.”

“What ways?” I ask and he says, “Ways I don’t like to mention. Start having notions and I’ll have to try some of ’em so lemme make this clear: don’t take-up with a man like Johnson. I reckon that’s all.” He shoots me a stern look and heads into the house. I smile smugly to myself. I’m happy to have inflamed his jealousy. He deserves to feel exactly how I feel: threatened, rejected, discarded, and betrayed.


	24. Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Four

While the riders roast the elk, I busy myself by preparing the house for the feast. I start by lighting our grand kerosene lamp suspending the ceiling and turning the wick low. At the central fireplace, I rake-up the smoldering ashes and toss-in long burn logs. Soon enough, the whole house is bathed in radiant heat and warm light, and is full of dusky wood-smoke, pleasant, cheery, and inviting. I’m very proud of this home. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world.

At the long spruce table, I set down tableware, big buckets of fresh water with aluminum dippers, and oil lanterns spaced at regular intervals. I drape hides and pelts over the spruce chairs, knowing the men haven’t had anything soft, warm, or clean beneath their bottoms in a long time. As I brew-up beans and bake biscuits at the woodstove range, the men drift into the house with heaping steaming slabs of roasted venison. They’ve brushed the dust from their clothes and combed their hair, and their faces are freshly-shaved and scrubbed clean. I can smell our fragrant cedar soap on their clean skin. They’re all very handsome and genial with a humorous light in their eyes. Their skin’s deeply-bronzed from the sun with the exception of a pale strip across their foreheads where their Stetsons shielded their faces. They sigh contentedly as they take their seats, settling into the soft plush hides. I work around the table, loading-up their plates with boiled beans and biscuits. I should find pleasure in seeing them so indulged, relaxed, and content, but I spend every moment nursing my anger toward Tommy. I can’t even look at him. I thought I was able to rein-in Joel’s killing moods with my gentleness, patience, and kindness, and all the compassion I showed him. I figured old age would bring him great understanding, tolerance, and moderation. He fought all these years to suppress those violent impulses but Tommy’s upended it all. 

The riders eat heartily, sopping-up the beans with their biscuits. Everyone talks with their mouths full. They pass around flasks of whisky, wiping-off the necks after they drink. Torres reaches across the table and pours a couple fingers of whisky into my glass. I’m appreciative of the gesture, of being treated as an equal. I wouldn’t mind getting drunk, I think to myself. I wouldn’t mind it at all. As I roll my glass around my fingers and sip, I feel Justice’s eyes on me. I look at him and he holds my gaze, smiling warmly. I smile back and it feels like we’re sharing a secret. I like him. He’s vital and magnetic, and he’s the biggest and most virile man here. “Pardon me, Boss,” he says to Joel. “Sure nice spread y’all got here. You and the missus been here long?” Joel replies to Justice but ignores the jab, saying, “Long about two years.” I suppose Justice is trying to rile him up but Joel won’t rise to it. Anyway, it’s not the time nor the place. “Tough territory out here,” Justice continues.

“No tougher than the Narrows,” Rogers says.

“Reckon we’ll light out right quick,” Tommy says and Joel asks, “Hard ride?” “West of Devil’s Canyon,” Tommy answers, “miles and miles into the heart of Crossbones Canyon.” “Is it secure?” Joel asks.

“No one knows where it is,” Strell says, “‘cause no one’s ever been dumb enough to try to find it. Folks don’t tend to get too inquisitive about us.”

“We pound leather till we come to a gorge,” Tommy says. “There’s a hidden trail behind a heavy patch of timber that winds through the valley to a smaller basin with a sheer rock wall. At first glance, it looks like a dead end, but there’s a cave that leads to a valley hemmed-in by towering ranges. The canyon leads to a lake where the mountains are covered in timber and the valleys are covered in tall thick grass. You can turn out your horses in the fall and they’ll be fat as a hogs all winter.”

“Pounding Hell to Heaven,” Garcia says.

“No river too wide or too deep to cross,” Brill says. “No man too tough to defeat, no popskull too vile to drink.”

“No pussy too wet or too loose to pound!” Torres adds with a laugh.

“Pit stop at Angel’s Bend!” Garcia yells with a devilish smile.

“Baptism by fire,” Lewis adds.

“Fellas!” Tommy yells, his eyes shifty. “Stop shooting-off your mouths!” Well, this is something. I noticed Tommy’s muscles stiffened-up at the mention of Angel’s Bend so I ask him what it is and he mutters into his glass, “It ain’t nothing you need to worry your head about.”

“Look here, Miss Williams,” Justice says. “A man gets awful lonesome hanging out in the mountains all day if you know what I mean.”

“Is it a whorehouse?” I ask, because it sounds like a whorehouse. Tommy shoots Justice a hard look and says, “Not in front of the kid, Johnson. Miss William’s ain’t old enough for that kinda talk.” Kid!? Tommy called me a kid! I’m a young woman of eighteen! Justice laughs and says, “I wouldn’t know if she was a man or a woman!”

“You’re a damned good liar, Johnson!” Strell yells with a laugh and the whole table joins in. I wait till the laughter dies down and ask, “There’s no women at your hang-out?” Garcia wrinkles his nose at this and says, “Women are worse than preachers at a hang-out!”

“Lemme ask you something, Miss Williams,” Lewis says. “What do you figure we boys do?” I take a moment to think about this because I hadn’t really thought about it. I was too preoccupied imagining all the dangers they’d run into. I suppose outlaws steal everything they come across. Raping, looting, plundering, and killing. “If I had to guess,” I say, “I’d say you sit around your hang-out with other outlaws, planning how you’re gonna rob people. You take their stuff, kill whoever comes after you, hole-up, and divide the loot. Then you get blind drunk, go to whorehouses, fight with other outlaws, and gamble-away your loot.”

Lewis laughs and says, “Well, most of that’s true, ma’am,” so I continue, “Do you set stuff on fire? Blow stuff up?”

“We always give ’em a fair chance to pull up stakes,” Lewis says, “but folks are damned ornery about pulling-up stakes.”

“You’re bounty hunters?” I ask the table. “Like that man on your horse?”

“When we’re acting as agents of justice,” Torres says. “Sometimes we chase down horse thieves. Outfits send out a call to break-up cattle rustler bands and bust-up stock thieves before they can steal entire remudas.”

“How long does that take?” I ask and he answers, “A week, sometimes weeks.” So I ask, “Who else do you work for?” 

“We’re sometimes acquainted with fifth columns and rebels. We go clean-up their big messes. Sometimes we roam around and get friendly with men we ain’t supposed to get friendly with.”

“Like double agents?” I ask.

“You could say that. We aim to send ’em on their way. If we ain’t in a killing mood, we scare ’em outta the country. Burn down their quarters.”

“Women and children?” I ask.

“We aim to get the job done, ma’am,” Torres says matter-of-factly. 

“We’re hell on raiders,” Brill adds. “We lay in wait till they make a haul and ambush ’em.”

“What about other outlaws?” I ask. “Do you kill them?”

“We ain’t claiming to be gentleman, ma’am. Unless we’ve been hired to break ’em up, we abide by the law of lawlessness. We ain’t interfering with one another. Whether you’re a rustler, a smuggler, or a hide hunter, we count on each other for mutual protection. Self-protection from our enemies. It’s known through word-of-mouth to the right men.”

“Lemme make something clear, ma’am,” Tully says. “We don’t straight-up rob folks. We intercept ’em. When folks get to being careless, we take their loot. We don’t see any particular harm in it.”

“There’s a powerful lotta down time,” Rogers says. “Lotsa hanging out in the woods, communing with nature. Sure makes a man mighty horny.”

“For the condition of horniness,” Drexel says, “there’s one prescription: liquor and a lay.” The table laughs and Garcia adds, “There’s nothing better than a big juicy ass in your hands, a ripe fat pussy under your nose, and a hot bitch trying to suck-off your dick!” The table laughs along and Brill adds, “All a man can ask for.” After the laughter dies down, Tully says, “It’s like this, ma’am. When a man gets lonesome for a piece of ass, there’s Angel’s Bend. It’s an old converted church run by a lady who keeps a couple girls around. Angela’s Angels. You know they’re hers ‘cause they’re branded like cattle. Right on their hips so you can’t miss it.”

I try very hard to keep my face blank as I start picturing this, Tommy and Joel having sex in a whorehouse with whores branded like cattle. Dark squalid rooms badly lit in red with dirty smelly greasy sheets. Men lining-up and picking-out the whores, all of them rough, and either too old, too young, too fat, or too thin. Whores ordering them to whip-out their dicks, prodding them like cattle, and checking them for STDs like you’d examine a cut of meat. Repeating the same old tired lines, the same lines they’ve said a thousand times to a thousand other men while lying on their backs and staring-up at the ceiling. Oh, yeah, give it to me! Yes, Daddy, yes! You like that? You like when I do that? Come for me, baby! The men go to the whores with an ache between their legs and the whores do their best to patch it up. It’s just a service, I suppose, like getting the tartar scraped from your teeth. I don’t know what they pay the girls but I can’t imagine it’s much, and I suppose they have to hand it over to the person who gives them room and board. 

“I reckon everyone’s got a place for pussy,” Garcia says. “Some are outside of town, some are old farms. Fathers renting out their daughters. There’s something for everyone. Rogers here? He likes the pigs in the pens.”

“I like 'em chubby,” Rogers says, and Torres laughs and says, “Fat as hawgs with big old floppy titties!” 

“It ain’t something to brag about,” Lewis says.

“Well,” Rogers replies, “I ain’t taking the trouble to deny it.” And Lewis says, “Alright, we’ll let it go at that.”

“Fathers whoring-out their own daughters?” I ask and Lewis picks-up on my troubled tone, saying, “You’re young, ma’am, I reckon too young to understand. It ain’t the men’s fault. It’s the system. If a man can’t beg odd jobs to feed his family, he’ll dig through the garbage. If he can’t find anything to eat, he’ll sell the bodies of his children for some potatoes or meat. It happens, ma’am. It’s part of life.”

I don’t like hearing any of this. I suppose I should be happy there’s a place the men can go when they get lonely. It’s probably safer in a whorehouse than riding around the wild territories, safer for the men to be in the arms of whores than rebels. The whores will take good care of them, I suppose.

“What’s the matter, Miss Williams?” Justice asks, interrupting the silence. “Why ain’t you eating?” Why aren’t I eating? In this whole world, there are only two people I care about. The one I love is going far away and the other I loved I found out was unfaithful. I held them both in great esteem and they betrayed me. Who could eat with that knowledge? All I really want in this world is Joel. Me and him in our safe little house. I wouldn’t care about a thing. Like, if an earthquake swallowed us up, what would it matter? We’d be swallowed-up by the earth and the dirt would close-up over our heads. It’d be a fine noble end to us. But that's the problem. Joel doesn't want any of that. He doesn't want to rot away in a tranquil peaceful home, warm and safe under my loving care. He wants violence. He wants to go out with a fight. “It’s nothing,” I answer Justice and he asks, “Not saying nothing, yeah? Well, I reckon I can guess. I reckon you ran into something you weren’t expecting, ma’am.”

I sigh deep and speak into my glass, “I think you’re gonna get yourselves into a lotta trouble one of these days.” Some of the men laugh loudly and pointlessly, and some keep their eyes on their plates. I suppose I’ve made everyone uncomfortable. Justice continues, “The expression on your face is plain as day. You don’t like your old man running with us boys.” “It doesn’t matter,” I say to my plate. “I wouldn’t be able to stop him.” I glance up at Joel knowing he’ll be furious I'm talking about his business in front of everyone. He returns my look with steady level eyes. A muscle at the base of his jaw twitches. He’s very angry. Anyone could see this. “Trying to do my thinking when you can’t even do your own?” he spits at me. He reaches across the table and yanks the glass of whisky out of my hand, saying, “You’re drinking too much, Ellie.” Tommy backs him, saying, “You’ve talked too much for one evening, Ellie.”

My mouth pulls into a twitching smile and my cheeks flush warm with embarrassment. Treating me like a child in front of all these men! I suppose I deserve it for humiliating Joel in front of everyone. I suppose I’m a little drunk. Rein-in your temper and be patient, I tell myself. Don’t lash-out. It betrays your jealousy. You need to think clearly.


	25. Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Five

Tommy takes command of the table and says, “Boys, pour yourselves another round ‘cause I’ve got something to tell you.” The men top off their glasses and look to Tommy with alert curious eager eyes. “Listen up, boys,” he continues. “Before that rattler took the starch outta me, I was fanning around the Dakota Ranges. The Wyoming-Montana Territory borderlands. In Helena, I ran into a man by the name of Luke Hull. I knew him from Spokane. In Spokane, he went by the name of Bill Belmont. Bill Belmont never made it outta Washington Territory, so Luke Hull’s been running things in Montana Territory. He’s in a mighty bad spot and asked us fellas to step in. It’s like this: Hull’s the foreman of the Powell ranch, the biggest privately-owned range in the territories, bigger than the government folks’ at Fort Philips. It’s owned by Jim Powell but Hull runs it to suit himself and he’s made Powell mighty rich with a heap of VIP customers. He’s a good boss who knows his business, and he’s lucky enough to have good grass and clean water—Powell’s range’s in the Spring Hills valley on the Wilson River, one of ’em smaller rivers that feeds the basin of the Alpine.”

“I know it, Chief,” Rogers says. “Near Benson Falls.” Tommy replies, “Certainly.”

“I know the territory, Chief,” Torres says. “It’s tough country. Normally you keep riding. Squatters?” “Lemme finish,” Tommy answers. “Squatters are inevitable. Generally speaking, they go peaceably, yeah? He ain’t worried about ’em and neither are we. Hull’s been telling me some things. He dropped word a wave of rebels came through with the intention of setting-up camp on his land. The War Kings.”

An ominous hush falls over the table. Some men hiss through their teeth. “That there’s a tough group of fellas,” Lewis says and Tommy replies, “The Kings are reckoning on crowding him outta his land. They already murdered ’em homesteaders and holed-up in their spreads, and he wants ’em beaten clean off the Omega strip. They’ve been rustling his stock and cutting-out steers from his herd, shooting-up wild game and leaving ’em in various states of decay. But that ain’t the worst of it, boys. He told me last month something was stirring in the valley. The Wilson went dry.”

“Dry?” Tully asks, baffled. “The Wilson?” Tommy replies, “Nothing but sunbaked mud.” 

“All my years in that territory,” Torres says, “I can’t ever recall it going dry.” Tommy replies, “The whole valley went dry. He figured it was mighty strange, seeing they had a wet spring and summer, so he went upriver to suss it out. When he got to Benson Falls, it was damned. Rows and rows of timbers, bank to bank. The Wilson’s been damned!”

“Land grabbers!” Strell yells and Tommy replies, “They want the whole valley to themselves.” 

“Them Kings are hogs,” Tully says and Tommy replies, “Powell’s livestock’s the best you’ve ever seen. Till now. His stock’s dying-off by the day, crops rotting by the acre. He’s losing customers by the dozens to low-grade stock. Them Kings are hell bent on stealing the valley and we’re gonna steal it back. Hull’s got a small army of cowhands and stablemen but them fellas don’t wanna start a range war so he’s called us in.”

“It’ll be a showdown, Chief,” Strell says in a grave tone and Tommy replies, “I’m expecting to. We’ll bust in there and stir ’em up, run ’em outta the territory. They’ve got their pick of any other valley in the country. If they don’t go—”

“You’ll kill them?” I ask, interrupting him, and Strell says to me, “They get a say in the matter, ma’am. They’re free to strike out to any of ’em border territories.”

“Driven out or be killed,” Tommy adds. “We tell ’em to fan it and don’t stop till they get to the other side of the territory!”

“Why not just kill ’em, Chief?” Brill asks. “Most of ’em Kings are wanted men. We could cash-in.”

“I reckon,” Tommy says, “but we’ll fight ’em fair.”

“What exactly’s coming-off here, Chief?” Tully asks and Tommy replies, “I’mma turn you boys loose. We’ll blow up the dam and see if they scurry or fight.”

“They don’t scare none, Chief,” Torres says and Tommy replies, “Neither do we. We’ll raise hell.”

“There’s gonna be a powerful lotta killing,” Garcia says. “A whole lotta murder.”

“It’ll end in bloodshed,” Drexel says.

“And a wash-out when the river comes down,” Torres adds.

“We’ll get the job done and haul ass,” Tommy says.

“The War Kings is a hard crew,” Brill says. “Stakes is high.” Torres adds, “If we kill ’em, it’ll be a declaration of open war.”

“That’s the idea,” Tommy says. “We’ll break ’em up if we have to kill every last one of ’em.”

“What’s the shell-out, Chief?” Lewis asks and Tommy answers, “Whatever the Kings leave behind. Bounty on ’em wanted fellas. Hull’ll give us as much livestock as we please.” Tully digs around his hair and says, “I’m plumb sorry, Chief, but that sounds like highway robbery.”

“That ain’t the end of it,” Tommy says with a knowing smile. He pushes his bangs back from his forehead and continues, “Listen up, boys. Hull’s offered us a permanent base.” The riders whoop and holler at this. I can tell by their reaction it’s a very good deal for whatever reason’s hidden to me. Tommy continues, “Cooks, blacksmiths, farriers, saddlers. Whatever we want or need. We offer protection in return.”

Okay, I get it. In exchange for protection, Tommy and his riders will use Powell’s ranch as a way-station where they’ll have free food, shelter, fresh horses, medicine, supplies, and refuge from other outlaws. If they rustle any stock on their own hook, they can camouflage the stolen ones among the ranch’s livestock, I suppose. I look over at Joel, the one person I love and care about more than anything else in this world. He means more to me than anyone I’ve ever known. He’s about to set-off on a dangerous mission with no guarantee of his survival, and the worst part is I can’t talk to him or Tommy about it. However long Joel’s gone, it’ll be too long, and I don’t even want to think about the possibility of him never coming back. Fact is, death’s always right there beside you. Every second of every day. No reason you should run from it but no reason to tempt it. These things must be considered and he’s considered nothing.

Tommy lifts a flask of whisky, proposing a toast, and the men raise theirs in response. “Here’s to wiping out the War Kings!”

“Send ‘em to Hell!” Garcia yells.

“Tear ‘em down!” Lewis yells.

“Drive ‘em to the Pacific!” Rogers yells.

“Stir ‘em up some!” Tully yells. The men clink their glasses and flasks, and pound on the table, drinking, laughing, and cheering. Brill raises a toast to Joel and addresses the table, “Here’s to our new boss! Bringing hell to the territories!” The men raise their glasses and flasks, and cheer Joel. Strell addresses him directly, “A man can’t tell much about you, Boss. You hardly ever seem to say nothing.”

“He’s the goods,” Garcia replies. “I’ve raised enough hell with enough men to know a good one when I see one.” Joel raises a bland smile and says, “I reckon y’all’ll have to figure it out yourselves. It ain’t my business to tell you.”

“Strell’s right about one thing,” Tommy says. “Joel’s gotta mind of his own.”

“He’s just shy!” Strell says with a laugh and Brill adds, “He’s bashful!” 

“He’ll always keep you guessing,” Tommy continues. “One day he’ll be polite to you, and the next, he’ll throw his gun on you. He doesn’t go outta his way to look for trouble, but when it comes, he settles it. Now, listen here, boys. I’mma tell y’all about one time he kept us guessing. Back in Boston. A man didn’t get much excitement out yonder. Not with all ’em damned Puritans running around!” he says and laughs. “I raised hell with my own gang in Allston. Joel hitched-up with the Back Bay Black and one of the best smugglers in the game. Tess Gardner was her name. Everyone knew who she was. You wanted it, she rustled it. Penicillin, lipstick, m67s, chocolate, coffee, whisky, lube, razors, skin mags.

“Long about a year into the game, Joel bought-out her partner’s share. He went by the name of Tack Turner. Fenway Tack. He was a tinhorn. Every gambling den has one—a low-class con. He dressed like a pimp. Gold fronts and tattoos, and diamond-studded chains. He kept his boots gleaming and his hair slicked back with oil. He was a greasy sonofabitch! He played too much poker to take proper care of his business and racked-up debts, and he wouldn’t stay away. Joel had to draw the line on that and asked me to back his play. It was time to collect. Tack was low down but well-connected—cops and mafia. It carried a risk. Whatever game he was running, he always slipped a marked card or two in the deck.

“We got the drop on him one night at the Last Chance, the Blacks’ hang-out, a den of sin on a seedy stretch of Comm Ave down by Fenway, a couple blocks from the Charles. You could buy and sell anything you wanted but you had to be slick. If you had the funds and connections, you could lay low without arousing the law. The whole cellar was dug-out with cells and tunnels that ran clear outta the QZ. It’s how I got out. Swept-out with the tide on a moonless night—but that’s a story for another time! We didn’t know if Tack would be alone or with his thugs. Didn’t matter. We were gonna come out blazing and we weren’t gonna let him bluff us. If anything went down, we’d shoot ’em all.” Joel takes over the story, saying, “The plan was to run him down to the slums to the Charles. Box him in. I hung back, and Tess and Tommy headed out to the alleys to head him off. I waited till I heard him coming. He was alone—drunk—holding onto the walls. I waited for him to pass and followed him, then I shoved my gun in the back of his head and told him to get those hands up. He put them up. I told him to walk. When he got to the first corner, he ran!”

Tommy laughs and takes over the story, “We were reckoning on that! That greasy sonofabitch ran straight into me! Then he took-off and ran straight into Tess. The only other way was down to the river. He talked mighty big but he skittered around those alleys like a scared little rabbit, running for his life, till he got to the river and there was nowhere for him to go but the foul water at his back. You didn’t wanna swim in that kinda water but he couldn’t swim no how.”

“Beg your pardon?” Torres interrupts, his tone incredulous. “Couldn’t swim?”

“Folks in Boston generally couldn’t swim a lick,” Joel explains. “Where were you gonna go? Swim to England? There were patrol ships that’d turn you into shark bait. We knew Tack couldn’t swim but he stood there looking at the water, trying to figure out if he was gonna jump. He was breathing hard. He was a big man, bigger than me, but he wasn’t in good shape. ‘Looks like luck ain’t running your way no more,’ I told him. ‘Time to settle your debts, Tack. Fork it over.’ ‘The shipment’s delayed,’ he goes, ‘Someone got their signals crossed.’ I aimed my gun at his head and told him to shell out, and he started blubbering like a baby.”

Tommy takes over, saying, “Now, we’d come to collect from folks before. This was nothing new but they were always defiant. Most of ’em would pound on their chests and tell you to go fuck yourself. Man’s born to die. You can’t stop it from happening. They’d taunt us to kill ’em and we sure obliged ’em!” Joel takes over the story, saying, “Tack stood there, begging for his life, said he wasn’t ready to go, said he wanted to live to see another sunrise. ‘I know what else he wants,’ Tess goes. ‘He wants me.’ ‘You seem pretty sure about that,’ I go to her and Tack goes, ‘She’d keep any man from straying.’ I told him to forget about her and he goes, ‘Is it a crime to love a woman?’” 

Drexel says to Joel, “Women are mysterious creatures, Boss. They know what they want and they’ve got their preferences.” Joel replies, “We all do, but Tack was mighty stubborn. I swung a fist into his face and sent him into the Charles.”

“Why didn’t you shoot the sonofabitch, Boss?” Rogers asks and Joel answers, “He wasn’t worth killing, wasn’t worth the bullet. I had no intention of killing him. It wouldn’t settle nothing. It’d just make things worse.” “How the hell do you figure on that, Boss?” Rogers asks and Joel answers, “Nothing's as empty as regret.”

“Life goes on,” Justice says, challengingly, and Joel pushes back, saying, “Does it? Tack was a dog but he was Tess’ old partner. I knew she didn’t want him killed. She hated him but she didn’t want him dead. She’d hate me, too, if I’d have done it.”

“Ain’t it just like a woman?” Torres says with a laugh. “Hating him but wanting to keep him alive so she could still think about him!” And Drill adds, “No good comes from trying to settle things for a woman.” 

Brill addresses Joel, “So a man’s supposed to do nothing when he sees a snake about to bite?” And Joel replies, “I ain’t shooting folks at the drop of a hat.” “Well,” Brill responds, “the one thing I’ve always admired is courage. And you’ve got it, Boss.”

“What happened to that sonofabitch?” Rogers asks and Joel’s manner shifts. I feel heaviness coming off him. This tells me it’s bad. “The Fenway Heist,” Joel answers. “Shook something loose. Tommy and his gang busted Fenway wide open on New Year’s Eve. The biggest theft in the history of the QZ.” After a long moment, Tommy addresses the table, “We waited till they were blind drunk and shooting-off flares, and we took a couple truckloads of small arms and light weapons. Medicine. Liquor. Gold bars and diamonds. FEDRA and a couple of them other agencies used Fenway as a depository. Artwork, statues, sports cars, grand pianos, carpets, furs, diamonds, gold, chandeliers—the third-largest armory on the East Coast after Manhattan and D.C. We passed the winter laying-low till the heat was offa us. We knew we’d hang for it.” Joel takes over the story, “In the QZ, anyone could make-up false charges against anyone. The police would round you up for no reason—out past curfew or gathered in groups. Law enforcement patrols. If they wanted to get to you, they’d hunt you down and lock you up for looking at them the wrong way. One night, they arrested me and charged me as a criminal suspect.”

“False charges, I reckon?” Garcia asks and Joel answers, “A witness and a suspect in an investigation. Tommy’s heist.” “They put you in jail?” Garcia asks and Joel answers, “An interrogation camp. Jail was a luxury. Jails have rules. You get your sentence and you do your time till you get out. Guards can be brutal or careless but they stay within the rules. They took me to a detention center. A military correctional facility on an island in Massachusetts Bay where they screened you and pumped you for info. You didn’t talk to nobody. Every cell had a couple listeners. There were no rules. No oversight. I was locked-up with renegades, outlaws, lunatics, and men who’d talked. We were held on a big campground with tents and sheds. Communal cells, cold and wet. Concrete floors and a whole lotta mud. No one bathed or changed their clothes. They’d come in the middle of the night and take men away. If they brought you back, they brought you back at dawn, bloody and beaten near dead. The fear was constant. Every night, a patrol came and made a big ruckus outside the tents. You’d wake up to it. They’d rip through the door and shine a flashlight in your eyes till they found who they were looking for.

“My turn came. They came for me. They grabbed my face and shone a flashlight into it. I heard a familiar voice. ‘If it isn’t Joel Miller.’ I couldn’t see who it was. They kept the light in my eyes. It was Tack. He’d gone renegade and joined the military, and rose to the rank of sergeant. His head was shaved. He was in military load-out but he wore it like always—shined and polished, bright and gleaming. ‘Remember me, Joel?’ he goes and I go, ‘Never saw you before in my life,’ ‘Then lemme refresh your memory,’ he said and clocked me in the jaw. They dragged me outside. It was pointless to run. The whole camp was wired and patrolled, inside and out. Even if you got past the guards, there were patrol boats in the bay.

“They brought me to Tack’s office. There was a big fire blazing, the first warmth I’d felt in weeks. That’s when they told me they were looking for Tommy. I knew they were gonna hang him and then hang me. I wasn’t saying nothing. ‘You’re gonna tell us some things we wanna know,’ Tack goes. ‘If you don’t, it’s just a matter of time till we find him, and when we find him, we’ll kill him.’ They offered me nothing in exchange. They didn’t need to.

“They led me down a path to the water till we came to a narrow inlet. I figured they were gonna straight-up kill me but they gave me another chance to talk. ‘We don’t wanna do this,’ Tack goes. ‘We don’t wanna hurt you. Tell us everything and we won’t tell Tommy who told us. It’ll be our little secret.’ I said nothing. They marched me into the water till I was up to my waist, and tied my hands and my legs at the ankles. I felt someone shove me in the back and I hit the water. I swallowed mouthfuls. My whole body felt like ice, like I was dying from the inside-out. Just when I thought my lungs would explode, they pulled me up by my hair. ‘We can keep this up all night,’ Tack goes. I didn’t answer. I could only gasp. Someone shoved me again and I went back underwater. All I remember was the sound of my lungs gasping for air and the feel of them exploding. Each time, I got weaker and weaker. At a certain point I didn’t know if I’d make it. They finally stopped. They laid me on my stomach till I puked-up all the water I swallowed. ‘That’s just a little taste, Joel,’ Tack goes. ‘Think it over. We’ll keep at it till you tell us where Tommy is. We’ll either kill you or get to him, and then we’ll kill him, too. Then we’re coming for Tess.’”

Hushed silence hangs over the table. The men’s faces are grim. There’s nothing to say to this. How can a man treat another man like this? There’s no dignity in this, no dignity in torture. You give into it and if it doesn’t kill you, it kills your will. It eats away at your soul.

“I reckon every man reaches his breaking point,” Joel continues. “But only a couple truly break. You can’t break a man who ain’t afraid to die. The trick is, you think of the worst thing happening to you in the world, go through it, and then nothing compares to it once it happens. Let ’em go on torturing you and tell 'em to go to Hell!” Some men laugh nervously at this. Me? I feel like I want to cry for everything Joel’s endured. I have the acute understanding the reason he’s invincible. Losing his daughter was the worst thing that could ever happen to him in the world and no other pain can touch it. It’s why I’ve never seen him cry. The worst thing in the world happened to him and nothing can come close to that. It’s made him unbreakable. He’ll survive anything.

“How’d you get out, Boss?” Garcia asks. “How’d you get out alive?”

“I arranged it,” Tommy says. “I knew a man on the inside. A sergeant. I sent-in a decoy: the Griffin.” He smiles knowingly and continues, “The Griffin was an Allston fixture. The dirtiest drunkest meanest old fisherman in the whole QZ. He hadn’t angled in a decade but he still stank like fish guts. You smelled him before you saw him. His only clothes were a thick wool sweater and a battered old pea coat, even in the summer. His hair was black and he never shaved. He was a nuisance and he could talk his way outta anything. He was Joel’s size and build, and I knew after a couple weeks of lock-up, Joel would look just as wild, so we got the Griffin blind drunk one night and called-in the cops for disturbing the peace. I got word to my man on the inside to keep him there overnight to dry-out, and to release him in the morning.”

Joel takes over the story from his perspective, “They brought-in the Griffin in the middle of the night, raging and roaring, blind drunk, and smelling like a red tide. Most of the men shied away but my gut told me there was something stirring so I kept my eyes peeled. The sergeant said he’d be back in the morning to release him. On his way out, he walked by and whispered in my ear, ‘Tommy reckons you’re the same size,’ and I put it together in a flash. Right before dawn, I gagged the Griffin and swapped his clothes. He was still so drunk, he didn’t even wake-up. I counted every second till dawn, till the sergeant came tearing-in. He grabbed me and goes, ‘I said I’d hold you till morning, and it’s morning! Get going!’ I acted the part, raving and muttering like a lunatic, cursing like the Devil. That front gate was only about fifty yards away but it felt like fifty-thousand. I walked straight onto a ferry. I’ll never forget the feeling of my first bath. I felt like the cleanest freest man in the world.”

Torres looks at Tommy with great awe and admiration in his eyes and says, “You’re a goddamn genius, Chief!” and Tommy answers, “I just tricked them’s all.”

“What happened to the Griffin, Boss?” Strell asks and Joel replies, “He was back on the street by nightfall, making a ruckus and wearing my clothes.” The men laugh at this but I don’t. I don’t find this funny at all. I feel like I want to cry. I want to hold onto Joel and cry. One thing’s clear: he’ll survive anything, and Tommy’s got pure cunning and nerve. The two of them are among the protection of tough brave riders, the best in the world. I suppose this should make me feel better but it doesn’t. I know one day their luck’s going to run out. Then what happens?


	26. Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Six

“Get your rest, boys,” Tommy says to the table. “You’ll need it. Tomorrow morning we ride. We light out at dawn.”

The men pull to their feet and head outside. Their manner is jovial. They’ve got full bellies and a free night of leisure in front of them. Why shouldn’t they be happy? They’ll sit around the campfire, smoking and drinking, till they retire to the courtyard and roll into their scratchy horse blankets to sleep. I won’t join them by the fire. I’ve got too much to do, like cleaning-up from dinner, getting the table ready for breakfast, and preparing Joel’s pack. My heart knifes when I think about this. Stop, I tell myself. He’ll be fine. 

I head to the kitchen to brew-up chicory coffee for the men to drink by the fire. I’m thankful to have something to keep my mind off my troubles. I start to clear the dirty dishes from the table and Justice ambles over. He leans against the wall and watches me while I work, distractedly rolling the rowels of his spurs back and forth over the floor. He takes off his Stetson, twirls it in his hand, and says, “Sure nice spread y’all got here.” It’s the same thing he said to Joel at the table. I smell whisky on his breath but he’s not drunk. It would take a barrel of liquor to get a man his size drunk. “We built it from scratch,” I say and he asks, “You and your old man?”

“He’s not my father.”

“Y’all hitched up?”

“I don’t have a boyfriend if that’s what you mean.”

“I sorta sized you up that way.”

“Meaning?”

“I like a girl who ain’t squeamish. Who knows what she wants. I reckon you ain’t as shy as you look.”

“I don’t wanna be tied down.”

“I know the feeling,” he says with a knowing smile so I add, “Everyone expects me to marry young and have a bunch of kids but I’m not that kind of girl. Maybe I’ll never be.”

“I’ve got no feeling for brats myself,” he says. “I can’t remember my own childhood. I’ve been a ranger since I was knee-high to a gnat.”

“Where are you from?”

“Abilene, Texas Territory. My old man was a Baptist missionary.”

“Really?” I ask and he says, “That’s what they told me.”

“You didn’t wanna follow in his footsteps?”

“Pestering folks with Bible jabbering?” he says with a laugh. "Didn’t seem to be the sensible thing to do.” We share a laugh, which fades to an awkward silence, so I break it by saying, “There used to be a mission of New Millenniums east of here,” and he responds, “Them’s a nuisance.” 

“Rebels raided it. Burnt it to the ground,” I say. He looks around the house and says, “I reckon they couldn’t sack this fort with a whole army if they tried.” “I always wanted my own place," I say. "I used to dream about it but I never figured I’d be lucky enough to have it.”

“You’ve got ambitions, yeah?” he says. “I like a girl with ambitions. I’d sure like to see your ambitions, ma’am.”

“I’m sure you’ve got them, too,” I say and he laughs like it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard. He must be drunk, is what I'm thinking. “Honey,” he says. “I’m an outlaw. Life don’t mean much to me aside from looting and robbing and rustling and shooting.” This makes me feel sad for him. It’s a very nice thing to have your own room in your own home with your own stuff, to lock the door at night and know you’re safe from trouble and danger. To know no one’s going to come and take your stuff or destroy it. I suppose that kind of life doesn’t appeal to men like him. If it did, he wouldn’t be an outlaw. He’s got a horse and a gun, and it’s enough to keep him happy. I know I’m right because he says, “All I need in this world is a horse between my legs,” and he looks at me directly and continues, “I’m wanting to show you mine, ma’am,” so I ask him, “Your horse?” 

“You’re interested, yeah?”

“What’s his name?”

“Rebel. You’ll understand a load more about how I feel after you meet him.” I follow him outside and we head for the corral past a large fireplace the men have built against stakes driven into the ground. They sit hunched around it, drinking, smoking, and laughing. Some sit on the ground on their horse blankets while others recline against their saddles. We stop at the corral, and the air is thick with the smell of horse sweat and horse shit. All the horses are strong and hardy. They must be close to 20 hands each.

Justice asks me if I want to play a game and I tell him sure, why not. He wants me to guess which horse is his. I don’t like playing these kinds of games so I make two halfhearted guesses and they’re both wrong. I don’t care. We laugh about this but I don’t find it funny and I don’t feel like laughing. Justice’s laugh is low and rumbling, and it feels genuine. His big lumbering dimwitted manner is as uncomplicated as the sun and it makes me forget momentarily about everything that’s troubling me. I like him but I know it’s not love. I know love: the thrill of nearness, the yearning desire that consumes your entire body, and the raging jealousy when someone threatens it. This isn’t that. I don’t want anything serious or deep with him. I know he’s not sincere and I suppose he’s only interested in me because I’m the only girl here. The other riders are polite and take a passive interest in me. I suppose they’re respecting an unwritten code that says no man’s allowed to mix with another man’s woman, whether it’s a daughter, a girlfriend, or a mother. It makes sense these kinds of men have this kind of code. I suppose Justice is the only one with enough insolence to defy it.

He slips his thumb and pointer finger into his mouth and makes a distinct whistle, loud, low, and slow. A tall sleek black Thoroughbred turns toward us with his ears forward. Justice whistles again, and the horse paws the ground, knickers a greeting, tosses up his head, and trots over. He lowers his long dark muzzle over the top of the corral and pushes his nose into Justice’s shoulder. Justice wraps an arm around his neck and pulls him into his chest. He loves his horse and his horse loves him. It’s plain to see. I find this endearing and I warm toward him. I reach up on my tip-toes and scratch his neck. He’s a lovely sleek muscular horse. “He’s a beautiful horse,” I say. “Is he wild?”

“All ’em horses are wild, ma’am,” he says. “Free as all ’em wild creatures out here, till we rope ’em and make ’em captive. He was born in the open range.”

“You roped him yourself?” I ask and he says, “I wrangled him, ma’am.”

“Really?” I ask and he explains, “We’ve got a corral about an acre with a long wing fence. What you do is get between the horses and the corral, and start making a ruckus to startle ’em! Clap your hands, wave your arms, stomp your feet, and get ready to chase ’em down! Head ’em off and drive ’em against the wing, then work ’em down and run ’em straight into the corral, whinnying and stomping like thunder. Then you wait for the dust to settle and pick-out the one that catches your fancy. Mount-up, rope him, and drag him out. Bridle him, saddle him, blindfold him, and hop on. Now, the horse ain’t gonna like that one bit. He’s gonna buck, high as a barn! But no matter what, you’ve gotta stay on. It’s the only way to break him.”

“Were you scared?” I ask, and he laughs and says, “Not with these big old spurs!” 

“Rebel’s sweet,” I say and he says, “He looks like a nice horse, quiet as a lamb, but he’s the meanest thing you’ve ever seen.” “But you’re always gentle with him,” I say, and he looks at me with a steady gaze and says, “Certainly.” His eyes are soft and warm. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe he genuinely likes me. He works his lips like he’s trying to say something but he doesn’t speak. Instead, he takes my hand in his. It swallows mine whole, like a bear paw. It’s warm and calloused in rope burns. He smiles at me with warm tender eyes and his face looks funny when he smiles like this, like it’s melting. “He ain’t been ridden by nobody but me, ma’am,” he says, “and he won’t stand for nobody fooling around on him. You wanna ride him?”

“But you said—”

“You’re different,” he says, interrupting me. “You’re a very little girl with very big ambitions.” Without warning, he scoops me up in his arms like a child and holds me against his chest. He looks down at me and sighs softly. His eyes are soft like he wants to kiss me, and his face is intimate and close. I don’t know if he’s going to kiss me or what and it feels awkward, so I ask him, “Are you okay?” He sighs deep and says, “I ain’t used to seeing so much beauty in one place, ma’am.” He smiles shyly and I smile back, and after a long moment, he swings me onto Rebel’s back. I grip him with my knees to keep myself from slipping-off without a saddle. Justice pitches against him and pats his neck, and I play with his mane. He lays his huge arm between my thighs and cups my knee, and I let him do this. I like the feel of his big warm hands on me. His forearm’s thicker than one of my thighs and he’s as tall as me sitting on his horse. “How’s he size-up to them other horses?” he asks and I laugh and say, “He’s a bit bigger.” He laughs along and says, “You sure know your way around him. Where’d you learn all that?”

“I picked it up.”

“I swear you look just like a Ranger on my horse. Darned if you don’t.” “Tommy would never let a girl join,” I say and he says, “Lemme ask you something, ma’am. Figuring your old man’s gonna run me off?”

“Why would he run you off?” I ask and he says, “‘Cause you’re the girl for me, Miss Williams. I feel my heart doing flip-flops. I reckon your father’ll be some fussed-up when he sees you getting thick with a man like me.”

“I’m sure he won’t make any trouble for you,” I say. “He’s not that type of man.” “Oh, he is,” he says with a laugh. “He’s that type of man, sure enough. The kind that’ll shoot a man for fun. Pardon me for saying so. I’ve got him sized-up right.”

“You’re your own man,” I say and he responds, “I’m a Hell’s Rangers man. I ride for Tommy Miller. If that means anything to you.”

“It doesn’t mean a thing,” I say and he says, “It should, ma’am, ‘cause a Hell’s Ranger man doesn’t mess with another rider’s lady.”

“I’m not anybody’s lady.”

“Do you love your old man?” he asks and I don’t respond. What business it of his if I love Joel or not? “Do you love him?” he repeats, his voice insistent, so I answer, “Of course I love him. He’s like a father.”

“You can’t love him.”

“Why not?”

“‘Cause you’re gonna love me,” he says and I can’t help but laugh at this. Love! What’s he doing, talking about love? He’s magnetic and vital but he’s not the kind of man I could ever fall in love with. “You’re just a girl,” he continues. “I reckon you can’t understand such things.”

“You can love two people at the same time,” I say and he says, “Show me.” He throws an arm around my waist, pulls me closer, closes his eyes, and comes in for a kiss. Our lips meet and he slips his tongue deep into my mouth. His breath’s hot and thick. There’s a feeling between us. It can’t be denied. He mauls at my skirt and slips his hand beneath it. He touches my leg and feels-up my thighs. I like the way his hands feel on me. He’s got the kind of hands that could snap a man’s neck like a twig. I want to feel everything he can do with those hands. He doesn’t even have enough hands for what I want to feel. Soon enough, he’s got those big fingers all over my twat. He pats it and strokes it like he’s petting a cat, smiling at me like we’re sharing a secret. It feels nice, his cock-sized fingers petting me all over.

“You like my horse?” he asks through kisses. “Wanna ride it?” He digs into my split and tries to run a finger up inside me. I pull away and tell him to hold up because there’s not a chance in hell he’d get one of his big fingers into my little hole without ripping me. I suppose this happens often enough to a man of his size because he doesn’t try to force himself in or try to pressure me into it. Instead he lays his middle finger against my split and slowly rubs it. “Show me how you ride my horse,” he says through kisses. “Show me, honey.” I start to slowly fuck myself against his finger, gasping into his mouth. He rubs it back and forth and up and down without going in at all. It starts making those wet sloppy cunt-fucking noises and it’s turning me on. It feels wonderful.


	27. Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“Get your damn hands offa her, Johnson,” a commanding voice says—Joel’s voice. “Don’t you put your filthy hands on Miss Williams!”

Justice turns to face Joel and starts reaching for his .357 Magnum revolver. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Joel’s hand move swiftly downward and upward. Pack! The bullet fired from his revolver rips into the ground at Justice’s feet and sprays dirt into his face before he can draw his weapon. If anyone doubted Joel’s skill with a gun, it’s been put to rest. The riders stampede over and gather around, their muscles tensed and ready. No one draws a weapon. It’s clear no one does any shooting unless Tommy gives the order. 

Justice’s right arm hangs loose at his side with his hand clawed over his revolver, holstered at his hip. He glares at Joel defiantly and says, “I ain’t afraid of you. If you’re afraid of me, we’ll know soon enough.” Joel holds his revolver rigid against his hip and leveled at Justice, and says, “It’s come to that, I reckon. Flash your gun or take it back! No man puts a hand on her, Johnson.” Justice doesn’t move nor speak. “Go on!” Joel yells, taunting him. “Flash that gun quick! I’ll fight you fair!”

Justice won’t draw his gun. He knows Tommy would kill him if he shot his brother, and Joel knows someone as dimwitted and graceless as Justice isn’t a skilled gunslinger. Joel pulls his .45 semi-automatic pistol from appendix carry and tosses it down at Justice’s feet, saying, “I don’t kill men in cold blood.” He’s taunting Justice, trying to work him up to a gunfight. If Justice won’t draw his own gun, Joel will provide it for him. “I ain’t falling for it,” Justice says. They stand tensed and glare at each other till Tommy’s whistle cuts through the night air. He breaks through the riders, and plants himself between Joel and Justice. “No one’s dying tonight,” he says, his voice firm and steady. His manner is calm and authoritative. He continues, “I’ll kill the first sonofabitch who makes a move. Put your guns away.”

Justice looks at Joel with a slight mocking smile. He keeps his chin thrust forward in an aggressive sweep. His manner’s completely changed. Around me he was untroubled, affectionate, and lumbering but with Joel, he’s contemptuous, threatening and hostile, and full of bitter savage rage. His hatred for him is clear. Tommy looks at Justice to address him. His eyes are bright and vigilant. He says, “Don’t make me turn against you, Johnson. If there’s gonna be a ruckus, I’mma get in on it. What do you think about that?”

“I don’t think nothing of it,” Justice says, his voice truculent, and Tommy continues, “I won’t have any trouble. First of all, them boys always back my play and they ain’t yearning to bust in on this. And second of all, it ain’t a good idea to stand so close to Joel when he feels like slinging his gun. Get on his bad side and he’ll damn near rip-off your arm taking your gun away!” The riders laugh at this, lightening the mood. After the laughter dies down, Joel addresses Justice, saying, “Now listen here, boy. I don’t wanna talk to you any more than I’ve gotta, so I’mma tell you one thing: don’t go throwing your gun on me when I ain’t expecting it or you might die right quick.”

“Lucky for you bullets are scarce,” Justice responds. “I wouldn’t waste one on you,” and without warning, he rushes toward Joel with his arm cocked. Before the blow can land, Joel sweeps his foot into Justice’s ankle and strikes him on the shoulder with the heel of his hand, grabbing his shirt and breaking his balance. Justice stumbles backward and catches himself on the ropes of the corral. He growls thunder and tries to swing out for Joel but the riders swarm and restrain him before any blows can land. He struggles against the men’s restraints, glaring at Joel with malignant eyes and a snarled nose. 

Joel addresses the men in a steady calm demeanor, saying, “Don’t get to worrying, boys. I ain’t killing nobody tonight. He’s safe for now.” He turns to Justice and says, “I was hoping we’d be able to get along, Johnson, but I’m warning you: don’t go playing games with me no more. After this, you listen to me or get lost.” “I’ve been listening to you, Boss,” Justice answers, “and I ain’t impressed. You ain’t running me off.” “Doesn’t matter,” Joel says. “You’ll go anyway.”

Tommy steps-in and addresses his brother directly, “I’ll take care of this, Joel. I’m mighty sorry, but Johnson ain’t civilized like the rest of us fellas. No use trying to pound sense in that thick skull of his.” He turns to Justice and addresses him directly, “Ain’t that right, boy? What’s eating you now? He’s sure got you riled-up.” “I was just testing him,” Justice answers, backpedaling, and the riders laugh at his insolence. Justice grins felinely and adds, “It was just a misunderstanding.” Tommy laughs and says, “Well, I’m having my say. No man does what you did and gets away with it. You take it back or get lost. If you leave, I’m sorry I’ve gotta part with you but there’s no other way.”

“Boss-man throwed down on me first,” Justice says, grappling for an excuse. “Ask Miss Williams. She seen it.” Before I can react, Tommy shoots me a stern look that says, You Keep Outta This. “Miss Williams ain’t butting into this,” he says. Justice doesn’t respond, so Tommy sneers at him and says, “Well, what of it?” “I reckon it goes your way, Chief,” Justice answers. “I reckon I went too far.” He takes off his Stetson, dangles it in his hand, and addresses Joel, saying, “I’m begging your pardon, Boss. I acted rather recklessly. I was riled. I heard a lot about you and I wanted to see if you were the right man for the job. Well, you are. Regular and right.” Joel approaches Justice for a handshake and says, “That goes.” They shake hands and the tension lifts. Mutual respect alights each other’s eyes. The feud’s over. 

“Now, look here, Johnson,” Tommy says. “I’mma tell you straight-up. You’re a damned fool. Miss Williams doesn’t just let any old fella take a shine to her. I reckon nothing much about you turns her head. She doesn’t think nothing of you. She might look like a young woman but she’s just a kid. After tonight, you won’t be gallivanting around here on that big black horse of yours bothering her no more. You’re never coming back. You keep away.” He turns to the men and addresses them, saying, “Now y’all know the agreement between me and Johnson. Now it’s only fair to put you wise to the agreement between me and Miss Williams.” He looks at me directly with cold hard eyes and my blood chills at this look. He continues, “I done warned you, child. He went after you and meant to make a fool outta you. And you were fool enough to get mixed-up in it. He sure handed you plenty!”

I’m overcome by a sense of confusion. Was Justice using me to get to Tommy and Joel? I think about this and feel it acutely. He must’ve used me just like I used him. I should feel a sense of betrayal but I suppose it doesn’t matter. Fact is, Tommy’s trying to humiliate me in front of his men and I won’t give him the satisfaction so I yell at him, “You’re wrong! He meant what he said!” Tommy sneers at me and says, “Hurts, don’t it?” in a mocking tone, and he continues, “You learned something, Miss Williams. You learned a man doesn’t always mean what he says. Johnson’s a big man. He does everything in a big way, including falling in love. He talks mighty big but he ain’t the kinda man for you. Johnson’s a liar. The truth ain’t in him.”

I address Justice directly, saying, “You weren’t lying to me, were you?” He looks at me, and his face is contrite and sincere. He says, “Them things I said, I meant. I wouldn’t say ’em things I said to you if—”

“Keep your mouth shut, boy!” Tommy yells, interrupting him. “It doesn’t concern you. It can’t concern you. That applies to Miss Williams, too. If I ever hear her name in your dirty mouth, I won’t wait for Joel to shoot you.” The riders laugh at this. Tommy addresses Justice directly and gestures toward the corral, saying, “You’re the next trick on sentry, Johnson. Go on. Pitch into your work and forget you ever met Miss Williams.”

Justice fusses with his Stetson and drifts over to the far side of the corral for sentry duty. Tommy waits till he’s out of earshot and addresses the men, saying, “Now what you boys don’t know about is the agreement between me and Miss Williams. I figured she’d get notions and she did. She’s always testing me, it seems like. You see, boys, I told her not to get mixed-up with y’all. I told her not to bother y’all and she laughed at me, said she wasn’t gonna pay me no mind. I told her if she disobeyed me, I’d come right back at her.” He looks at me directly. His eyes blaze cold jealous rage, and he adds, “And here I come.” I gasp at the acute understanding he’s going to punish me like he’s never punished me before, cruel and humiliating, and he won’t stop until he knocks all the pride out of me. I start to beg him, saying, “Please don’t do it, Tommy,” and he sneers, “Do what?”

“You don’t need to do it.”

“You remember I told you not to get mixed-up with my boys? That’s what I meant. No use whining over it. You had it coming and I’d even say you were looking for it. You had to have it, yeah? Well, now you’re gonna get it!” The blood drains from my face and a cold sweat breaks-out over my brow. He wants to beat the independence out of me, beat the smugness out of me. Think, I tell myself. Think! What are you going to do? I could run, I suppose. I’m quick. Probably quicker than half these men in their heavy ammo belts and heeled boots. I know this territory like the back of my hand. I could reach the mountains and lose them in the timber. I think about this and absentmindedly finger my skirt. It’s full and long, and it sweeps the ground when I walk. I can’t run very fast without gathering it up, and it would still hinder my stride. I glance at the corral. I could jump in there and stampede the horses. Create a magnificent diversion with a thick cloud of dust. I could slip away in the chaos and get a good head start to the mountains. Then I think about the horses. They’d be terrified, snorting and rearing in sheer terror, and stampeding in senseless confusion. I couldn’t do that to those beautiful horses. They did nothing to deserve that. One of them would get hurt. Break a leg and have to be put down. No, that won’t do. That won’t do at all.

Tommy watches me as I think about this, my eyes deep in thought and my lips pulled tight in indecision. I suppose he anticipates me running-off. Of course he does. He’s always a dozen steps ahead. I know I’m right when he pulls himself up full length and says, “Miss Williams, don’t you move. Don’t even try it. We’ve got the drop on you!” I look at him and all I can picture is his big strong arm holding his belt, tossing it back higher and higher, and crisscrossing my ass in ugly blistered red weals. I won’t be able to sit for two weeks straight. I won’t take my punishment voluntarily. I won’t. Not without a fight. “Miss Williams,” he continues, his voice commanding. “You get over here right now. No use wasting my time. I ain’t in a good mood, yeah?”

What’s it going to be, I think to myself. What are you going to do? Choose, dammit, choose! I choose. I whip my skirt from my legs and sprint past the corral, heading for the foothills. At my back, I hear the men shouting and Tommy’s distinct whistle, followed by thundering footfalls. The men whoop and holler as they chase me down the flat, like they’re chasing stampeding livestock. This makes everything worse. I shriek in horror, my eyes watering terror. I lift my skirt higher to speed my legs, swirled in dust.

An ominous swish sounds from behind me and my eye is drawn to a shadow above my head. I throw-up my arms to swat it away and as I duck, a braided lariat settles around my shoulders, pinning my arms to my side. The rope straightens and tightens, and I crash to the ground. I’m dragged through the dust a couple yards till I’m jerked to an abrupt stop. Half a dozen riders fan around me, watching me thrash around in the dust like a fish out of water. Their faces are amused. I suppose they find this very entertaining, watching a helpless girl roll around in the dirt with her skirt bunched-up between her thrashing legs. They let me do this for a minute till they pull me to my feet and hold me tight. I shriek and fight against them, whipping my hips and tossing my shoulders. I can smell the whisky and nicotine on their breath, and the cooking fire smoke on their clothes. A large hand covers my mouth to stop me from screaming. I gag against the smell of dirt and sweat, grunting against the fingers. I realize soon enough the men are bigger and stronger than me. and I’m outnumbered—it's no use—so I go quiet and hold myself still.

I watch Tommy as he strides down the flat, coming toward us. He’s in no rush and this makes it worse. He walks slow, determined, and confident, like he’s out hunting quail. He’s in a killing mood. Anyone could see this. He squares in front of me and addresses Drexel who's holding the long end of the rawhide lariat, saying, “Mighty nice night for wrangling strays.” Drexel smirks and says, “Reckon you’ve gotta hankering for some sweet baby beefs, Chief.” Tommy looks at me directly and says, “Something interesting out yonder, Miss Williams?” His tone is sarcastic and mocking. “Looking for something in particular? Find what you’re looking for?”

“You can’t do it!” I yell into the hand clasped over my mouth but my words come out muffled. Tommy says, “Let her speak,” and the hand falls away. “I won’t let you do it!” I yell and he says, “You’re sure acting like you don’t wanna get thrashed. I’mma fix it so you do.”

“You can’t! You can’t make me! You can’t do it!”

“You’re interfering with my business, Miss Williams,” he says. I look around at the men’s faces and they watch me with vigilant sober eyes. It’s clear there’s no use appealing to their mercy so I look around till I find Joel. His manner’s unconcerned and indifferent. “Joel!” I yell. “Stop him! You can’t let him do it!”

Before Joel can respond, Tommy addresses him directly, saying, “Authority to give orders comes and goes with me.” 

“Do something!” I yell at Joel and he says, “I can watch you get thrashed and that’s what I’mma do.” I gasp at this and say, “You’ve got a gun! Use it!”

“And what’s your reasoning?” he asks with a sneer. “‘Cause a man’s gotta discipline a disobedient child?”

“If anything happens to me, it’s on you!" I yell. I look around at the men and address them directly, "It’s on all of you!”

“My boys ain’t interfering none,” Tommy says. “They ain’t to blame for your disobedience. Don’t rub it in.” He turns to the men and addresses them, saying, “Don’t listen to her, boys. She’s a fine girl and I don’t blame any of you fellas for being concerned about her safety, but she doesn’t need protection. She’s about as delicate as a grizzly bear!” He slips his thumb and forefinger into his mouth and whistles. “Fan it, boys!” he yells and gestures toward the house, “Before she raises any more hell!”

Drexel picks me up and tosses me over his shoulder. He strides across the flat to the campfire where he lays me on the ground. I struggle to rise but it’s futile with my arms pinned to my sides. Resigned and hopeless, I pull myself up into a sitting position with my shoulders slumped forward and my legs tucked against my bottom, deer-like. Tommy and Joel square in front of me, and the riders fan around them, looking on. The only sound is the snapping crackling embers as they pop into the night sky. Tommy breaks the silence, saying, “Miss Williams, you and me are having it out.”

“Do you want me to apologize?” I ask, my voice soft, and he yells back, “Don’t interrupt me! I’ll have no disobedience, do you hear me? I expect no more arguments. Now, I’m sorry things have turned out like this. I know you can be a good girl when you put your mind to it but you ain’t the sort that gets to learning. You ain’t reliable. You don’t keep your word and now there’s hell to pay. So here’s the trick: Joel deals with you first. Twenty lashes for disobedience, whatever his play.”

I gasp and look at Joel, yelling, “You wouldn’t!” He returns my look with steady eyes. His manner’s cold, calm, and sober. He says, “You deserve what’s coming to you, child.”

“Joel and I split equal,” Tommy continues. “After he’s through with you, I’mma give you twenty lashes with my belt for rebellion, over my knee.”

“No, Tommy! Please not that!” I yell and he looks at me with savage eyes, saying, “I’mma thrash you into tomorrow, child.”

“Please, no, Tommy!”

“That ain’t the end of it so listen good. We’re an outfit, me and my boys. They take their regular share after Joel and I split ours. They wrangled you, they pitch-in part of it. They brought-in the bounty and they get a cut—and they’re gonna collect on it.” He looks around at his men, smiling wolfishly, and says, “How about it, boys? Y’all wanna little excitement?”

“We’re with you, Chief!” a voice yells.

“Take her down a peg!” another yells.

“Settle the score!”

“Tan her hide!”

“Whoop her ass!”

“Give her a licking!”

Tommy addresses Joel, saying, “You with me, Boss?” and Joel responds, “Let’s get to it.” Tommy laughs at this and says, “Texas always gets ‘em!”

“You can’t do it!” I yell at Joel and he says, “I reckon I can, and I’m about to get started, so you can get to worrying.” He strides over, shoves me down on my back, and pushes me into a backward roll. I shriek and grunt, kicking against him and begging him to stop. He grabs my legs by the ankles and draws them up over my head till my feet pass over my far shoulder. He holds me in this position and rips down my skirt, tucking it around my waist. I struggle, my underwear straining against my plump ass cheeks and the elastic puckering against my skin. Without warning, he gets right to it. Smack! His open palm comes down hard, swift, and square over my right ass cheek. I cry out and jerk my hips with a strangled grunt, my whole backside lifting against his hand and dropping back down. I gather my breath and brace for the next blow. Smack! It comes quick, landing over the top of my right thigh. I shriek as the fresh pain flares bright, and I thrash my hips from side to side to dispel the sting. The blows are excruciating in this position because the flesh on my bottom is less taut.

Smack! His hand falls swiftly over the top of my left thigh. I wail and kick-out a leg, my whole body trembling. The snug fabric of my panties bites into the softness of my skin, the seams bulging to the point of bursting. “You’ll get a dozen more if you don’t keep still!” he yells and his weight comes down on me hard, his cock digging against the back of my thigh. He holds me in place and brings down his hand. Smack! He strikes low across both ass cheeks right where I sit, his fingertips smacking my twat as the blow lands. I shriek and gasp. A burning flaming heat sears my backside, the skin tight and covered in sweat. Smack! Smack! Smack! Smack! The crack of his flat palm against my skin echoes off the walls of the house. His blows land harder, quicker, and swifter. With each smack, he bucks against me, his cock digging against the back of my thigh. Smack! His hand bounces off the center of my jiggling ass cheeks and my thighs sizzle in agony. I wail, thrashing my hips from side to side. Smack! The final blow comes hard and fast. I howl, my whole body shuddering. I buck against him and flail my hips, clenching and unclenching my ass cheeks in agony, begging him to stop. He stays right on top of me as he catches his breath.

“Look at that color!” a voice yells. “Like two ripe tomatoes!”

“That’s a healthy glow!” another yells.

“The good Lord gave her that ripe juicy little peach so it could take a good beating,” a voice says with a laugh.

Joel takes my face in his hand and squeezes it hard. He looks at me directly. He wants to tell me something. This is clear. He puts his mouth right up to my ear, like he’s going to tell me a secret, and says, “You belong to me. Don’t you ever forget it. Not to Johnson. Not to Tommy. None of ’em. No one but me. Say it! You belong to me.”

“I belong to you, Joel,” I whimper.

“You forget it again, I’ll come after you and tear you down. You hear me, child?”

“Yes, Joel.”

“Punishment’s over. Get up.” He rolls me into a sitting position and I wince as my tender ass makes contact with the ground. My hair falls freely over my face and I make no effort to move it away. I can’t with my hands bound to my sides, anyway. I don’t dare look up. The only thing I can see past my hair is the men’s heeled boots with their big long spurs, the leather scuffed and scratched. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Ten pairs of boots. Ten men. Ten more of them than there are of me.

“Don’t get to sorrowing, Miss Williams,” Tommy says. “We’re just getting started!”


	28. Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“You’re growing up fast, Miss Williams,” Tommy says, “and I reckon you know a thing or two about men. You should, ‘cause after we’re through with you, you’re gonna see the worst side of ‘em. You sure gave us an eyeful, catting around Johnson like a bitch in heat. You were doing everything but asking for it! You wouldn’t know the first thing to do if he felt like throwing you a fuck. That boy’s big enough to choke a longhorn steer!” The riders laugh. He waits till the laughter dies down and continues, “As long as we’re here, me and my boys aim to fuck them foolish notions clean outta you. I reckon by the time we’re through they’ll be mighty acquainted with you.” He pulls a deck of cards from his back pocket and says, “Let’s get down to business, boys.”

What’s this? A game of cards at a time like this? I look around at the men’s faces and no one seems surprised. They must know what’s up. Joel must know, too, because he says, “I ain’t fit to play cards tonight, brother.” Tommy’s eyes harden and he says, “You’re fit enough to play cards around the man who made them!” “Anyone who plays a low down dirty game like that on a woman ain’t fit to be a man,” Joel says. Tommy’s whole face ices over and he says, “I’ve seen you do a lot worse things, brother.” Since the day Tommy came back, I knew it was just a matter of time till he clashed with Joel. Despite their outward comradery, the hatred between them is still there, simmering below the surface. There’s always been room for trouble between them. I knew if they stayed in each other’s orbits long enough, their hatred would end in a fight. Tommy’s hastening it and I think I know why. They both love me. It’s very dangerous when two vital men love the same woman. No man wants to taste another man on his woman.

“We ain’t arguing that,” Joel continues. “I’ve done my part. She learned her lesson.”

“That ain’t the question,” Tommy says. “A principle’s at stake here. She disobeyed us. She’s been complicating things. We’ve gotta way of dealing with troublemakers. One of us boys is gonna fuck some discipline into her. Fuck a lesson into her she won’t ever forget. You’re a Hell’s Ranger now, and Hell’s Rangers throw in together.” “I sure as hell ain’t throwing into that,” Joel says, meaning me. Tommy sneers and says, “That’s not what I’ve been hearing.”

“Meaning?” Joel asks and Tommy responds, “Miss Williams’s been telling me some things and I aim to find out if them things are true. Do you fuck her like she said?” Blood rushes into Joel’s face and quickly drains away, leaving him pale. He hates people talking about his business, especially where he’s been sticking his dick. He’s a man of the South with all of his passionate pride and deep prejudices. His integrity, and his sense of honor and duty are deeply ingrained. The thing is, he doesn’t actually care if other men fuck me as long as they don’t try to take me away from him. His muscles gather-up and his chin pulls into an aggressive sweep. He says, “No one’s putting a hand on her, Tommy. I’m her guardian and it’s my business to take interest in every man who looks at her.”

“There’s a lot more of us than of you or her,” Tommy responds. “It’s gonna get done.”

“You’re running a crooked game here, Tommy.”

“I wouldn’t say that again if I were you, Joel.”

“And why not?”

“‘Cause you know me better than that. I’m out for a fair deal and I’mma get it. I’m running this game tonight.”

“No man’s gonna paw her around!”

“Try to stop us,” Tommy says and Joel doesn’t respond, so Tommy taunts him, saying, “Back up your play or take it back!” Joel pulls his revolver from his hip and sweeps it over the men. “I’ll kill the first sonofabitch who touches her!” he yells, his voice thunderous. I don’t get excited over this. In fact, no one does. The men know him well enough to know he doesn’t kill recklessly. He throws his gun on Tommy and yells, “You touch a hair on her head, I’ll go gunning for you and I won’t stop till I kill you!” Joel would never kill Tommy. He doesn’t have it in him. He might shoot him to give him a warning but he won’t kill him. We all know this. Even if we didn’t know this, you can tell by the half-hearted way he holds his gun. Still, Tommy blanches and stiffens. I suppose no man, no matter how fearless he is, likes to see a gun pointed at him. He says, “Expecting to shoot someone, Joel?” and Joel responds, “I might could.” Tommy scoffs at this and laughs dryly. The color returns to his face and he says, “I didn’t think you’d try to work that bluff on me, brother.”

“Try me,” Joel says

“You ain’t working that gun on me. You ain’t that kind.”

“Maybe I oughta remind you I do my killing in my own way,” Joel says and Tommy responds, “Maybe I don’t care!” He takes a running leap toward Joel, strikes his shin with his boot, and stomps on his toes. Joel bellows and grabs Tommy by the lapels. Tommy strikes a blow into Joel’s jaw, breaking the hold. Joel’s head snaps backward and Tommy grabs him from the rear. Joel bends at the knees and tries to twist away, smashing his elbow into his brother’s armpit. Tommy strikes into Joel’s kidney, breaking his balance and taking him to the ground in a stranglehold. Tommy lays on the ground on his stomach, with Joel on his back. He pulls his arm tight into Joel’s throat and locks his head in a snug hold, trying to strangle him. Joel thrashes and twists in the dirt, trying to break his brother’s hold. Tommy rolls his shoulder and starts winching his arm against Joel’s throat. My blood ices with the understanding he’s trying to break his neck. No, Tommy, no! For God’s sake, no! I start to rush toward them but before I can reach them, the riders seize me and hold me back. I thrash wildly, shouting for Tommy to stop, till a big hand covers my mouth. I cry out and beg, but my shouts and pleas are deadened by the hand over my mouth.

Joel chokes and grunts, his face livid. He must realize Tommy’s trying to break his neck because instead of thrashing against him, he starts moving with him. Tommy keeps choking Joel until his body goes limp. I’ve seen enough men with broken necks to know Joel's isn’t. He’ll be knocked out for a while but he’s not dead. Tommy would never outright kill him like that. He hates him too much. He’d torture him first before he killed him.

He pulls to his feet, dusts himself off, and looks smugly at Joel’s body laid long and flat in the dust. Drexel digs around his hair and says, “That was a hell of a thing to do, Chief,” and Tommy answers, “I wasn’t expecting him to butt into the game. We’ll run things to suit ourselves now.” He hands him the deck of cards and tells him to cut them. Drexel shuffles the deck and sets them face down on a serape blanket laid by the fire. Tommy takes the top half from the deck and sets it down at its side. Drexel picks them all up, squares them in his hands, and fans them out, face down. Each man takes a turn drawing a card. They turn them over and hold them out for all to see. After they’re all drawn, all eyes go to Tommy. He struts around with his card held high above his head. He holds the ace of spades. His card gets me. “It’s Tommy Miller’s play, boys!” he yells. “And what Miss Williams needs right now is a man like me. One who can satisfy her in every way!”

“You lay a finger on me,” I yell, “Joel’ll kill you! I hope he makes you suffer!”

“I’mma put you wise to it, Miss Williams,” Tommy says, “‘cause I reckon you’re too slow to figure it out yourself. Joel ain’t on the level. He’s a coward. Always has been and always will be. You can’t put the fight in a man if he ain’t born with it. Can’t make a hero outta a coward. A coyote can’t turn into a wolf.”

He squares in front of me and starts stripping-off his rigging, tossing it to the ground. “Now I want you to understand this, Miss Williams. I’mma fuck you till I’ve fucked myself out on you. Then I’mma take you inside and each of my boys gets a turn tucking you into bed. Face down, I reckon, by the time we’re through with you. They’re gentlemen but they can play rough when they wanna.” He turns to the men and says, “Shuck her, boys!”


	29. Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Crack! I wake with a start. The early morning sun shines in my eyes. I don’t think that’s why I woke-up. I remember hearing a loud crack. I swear I heard this. I’m sure that’s what woke me—the flat sharp crack of a rifle, off in the distance. I listen but I don’t hear a thing. I look around and realize I’m in a patch of thick timber, curled fetal between two large boulders, which come together to form a natural shelter. I slept here last night. That’s right. It slowly comes to me. Now I remember. Yesterday I said goodbye to the Providence men. I felt very bad about leaving them behind but I don’t regret the decision. They fought valiantly in the liberation of Providence but they’d be useless out here. After long-suffered starvation and malnutrition, their eyesight was weakened, and their coordination and reasoning was impaired. Their bodies were thin and wasted. Their legs would’ve quickly tired over the uneven steep terrain. This is crucial because I’m headed toward the mountains. Upwind, whichever way the upland breezes blow.

When the Fireflies escorted me in and out of the Rock, I was in a black-out hood, but I was able to understand my surroundings by the movements of the horses beneath me, and the smell and feel of everything around me. For example, the way the air felt fresher, sharper, and cooler against my skin told me we were out of the valleys and plains. Or judging by the rich scent of the cedars and pines, I knew we were in the mountains. The Fireflies probably took a circuitous route to confuse me but I know without a doubt the Rock is set in mountainous terrain. I’m certain of this from what I sensed by my surroundings. Fifth columns and rebels always hole-up in the mountains, anyway, so that’s where I’m headed. I don’t know exactly where I’m going, how I’m going to get there, or what I’ll find when I arrive, but I know one thing: I’ll reach the Rock and find Joel. I know how far I can go, how much I can accomplish with very few resources, and how little it takes to survive.

I gear-up under the rising sun and follow a trail through dense timber worn deep by overwintering elk. Soon enough, I hear a distinct sound coming from the northern crest so I halt and listen. I can’t place the sound, faint and rhythmic. I jog another minute, halt, and listen until it comes again, and realize it’s the unmistakable sound of metal striking the hard earth in a steady dig. A shovel or a spade. I break the trail and hike the northern rise. Halfway up the crest, I prone out and crawl forward, pushing my submachine gun ahead of me as I advance. A north breeze blows, and carries the distinct smell of horses and horse shit.

I reach the rise and take cover behind a large felled tree. It looks out onto a small sunlit circular meadow hedged-in by boulders, backed into a brow. There are men and horses here. Beneath the shade of a large chestnut tree, three tacked-up Saddlebreds graze and snuffle. These are very nice horses, I think to myself. Tall and strong with full manes, glossy nostrils, erect ears, and swishing tails. I could cover a lot of ground on one of these horses. At the opposite end of the clearing, I count four men. A tall rangy man digs-out a narrow trench with a shovel. He’s already dug it chest-deep and about eight-feet-long. He wears a broad-brimmed grey Stetson drawn low over his forehead, so I can’t see his face, obscured in shadow. He holds his head low to the ground as he digs. Judging by his sweat-soaked clothes and the depth of the pit, he’s been digging for a while. He’s overseen by three kitted-up rebels who stand on the trench ledge with their assault rifles cradled loosely in their arms. How do I know they’re rebels? There are only two types of men you find out here: rebels and mountaineers like Barnhart. The men wear camo but there’s no uniformity to their dress. Despite the clean mountain air and sunshine, they’re pale and exhausted with dark bruises under their eyes, because all rebels do is train.

Where did these kinds of men find such nice horses, I wonder. I suppose they killed someone or stole them because they’re too nice for rebel horses. I think about killing these men for their horses. This would be easy. I only need one horse but I’d have to kill all the men, and set the remaining horses wild and I suppose they’d eventually ride homeward. I saw no signs of camps nor settlements close by, so I could easily kill the men without arousing an ambush. I think about this. I’d rather not kill four men for one horse because I don’t like killing when I don’t have to kill. Well, there’s time to think about this because these men aren’t in a hurry. They must be enjoying the break from their grueling training to watch this digger dig this hole. Who knows what he’s digging? You could dig a lot of things in the ground: a latrine, a garden, a hidey-hole. Plenty of things can be dug in the ground.

He digs until the trench is the size of a grave fit for a man of his size. I picture this in my head and realize he’s probably digging his own grave. Why do I suppose he’s digging his own grave? It’s none of my business! Time to move on. I wanted to see what the sound was and I found it. This is it. I’ve seen it so now I can go. I realize I won’t waste my bullets killing four men for one horse. It doesn’t make sense. Just as I decide to leave the men and their horses to their predictable fate, something strange happens. The digger stabs the shovel into the ground and braces the handle like a saint holding a staff, and he whines, “My back’s sore.” I freeze at the sound of his voice. I feel like I know that voice but I can’t place it. Someone from Jackson? Boston? Providence? I can’t see his face. He’s too far away and his Stetson’s pulled too low. I think of who could belong to that voice but no picture comes to mind.

One of the rebels laughs at the digger and says, “Your back ain’t gonna bother you much longer!” He’s clearly the leader. He’s taller and better-looking than the other two, and his weapons are newer and unadorned. The other two have stocks covered with crude graffiti, which I suppose is their militia insignia. The digger doesn’t care what this man has to say. He braces the pit ledge like how you’d pull yourself out of a lake onto a dock. He does this elegantly like he’s spent his whole life swimming, but before he can pull himself up to the ground, the leader kicks him square in the chest, propelling him fiercely back into the trench. The digger’s head snaps backwards from the blow, his Stetson sailing the wind. He lands flat on his back and lays immobile, momentarily stunned. His grey hair is plastered to his head with sweat and deeply imprinted with his hatband. His face is thin and angular with high cheekbones. He wears an eyepatch over his right eye. After a long moment, he rises stiffly to his feet with a groan and brushes-off the mud from his jeans. I find this funny. No man facing death with such certainty should care about the state of his clothes but for whatever reason, he does.

The rebels draw-up their semi-automatic guns and target his chest. It’s clear they’re going to kill him. “Wait!” he yells and flags his hands, black with dirt. That face! I know that face! I know that voice! Skane! It’s Skane! He continues, “Which one of you sonsofbitches know the Lord’s Prayer?” The rebels exchange baffled looks at this. Rebels aren’t smart men. This is a fact. Skane continues with a grim smile, “It’s only fitting for a dying man’s last request. I want you to sing it for me. In Latin. Go on—gimme your Sunday best!”

“There are no terms,” the leader says, baffled. “You can’t set terms.” I know I shouldn’t find this funny but I do. I find it funny to see Skane in such a bleak predicament, overpowered by such rudimentary men, because I always imagined his death would be heroic and noble, something worthy of his bloodline. Like, he’d go up in a blaze of glory. An immolation or set aflame on a pyre. It’s funny to watch him tease these crude men in the face of death. Taunting rebels! No one does this! But Skane doesn’t fear them nor death by them, and it’s the most entertaining thing I’ve seen in ages. So I wait and watch. I frankly don’t feel strongly about his fate. Anyone in my position would be ambivalent. Who’s he to me? He’s no one. We fucked each other and then he sold me into slavery. So where does that leave us? We’re not friends, that’s for sure.

The leader redraws his muzzle at Skane’s chest and says, “I’ve got a whole lotta bullets in this gun but I only need one. Hell, I don’t even need to waste the bullet! You've already dug your own grave!” Skane’s manner shifts at this. The humor leaves his eye as he soberly realizes his fate. I figured they’d kill him first before they buried him but they’re rebels. They don’t do things the pleasant civilized way. No etiquette for the man of etiquette. They intend to bury him alive. He won’t be given the courtesy of a quick easy death.

“Get on your back,” the leader instructs him. “Go on, make yourself comfortable.” Skane reluctantly sits down on the ground and lays on his back. The leader tells Skane to fold his arms over his chest and Skane obliges. He lowers himself into the grave, fishes a length of rope from his chest kit, and binds Skane’s wrists and ankles. Then he pulls himself out of the grave and they start to shovel-in dirt, burying Skane alive. What kind of men would do this? What’s Skane done to deserve this? I think about this and realize it’s a stupid question because he’s probably done nothing wrong at all. Rebels don’t need any reason to do cruel things.

They load-up the grave with soil until it heaps over the top, and stand around admiring their work, laughing and joking. I wonder how long it’ll take for Skane to die. Longer than drowning, that’s for sure. They’ll have to cover his grave with heavy stones or else the wolves will dig him up at dusk. Everyone knows this. They know it, too, because they start scavenging the ground for large rocks over by the big boulders framing the crest. They load-up their arms, return to Skane’s grave, and pile it up with rocks. I watch them do this a couple times till I grow bored. This is boring. This could go on forever. Making a big pile of rocks over a grave. What’s the point? I see these same kinds of graves every single day, some with crude crucifixes sticking out of them.

It must not feel very good to be buried alive. I suppose at a certain point you’d panic, feeling the cold damp heavy earth slowly crushing your body. It can’t be pleasant. But why should I care if he’s killed like this? He caused me and Joel great suffering and injury. He sold us into slavery and delivered us to Eph. I wonder if his payment was worth it. It must’ve been very small. Probably a handful of crappy old guns, which had to be divided with Murdock and Greer, or maybe he got nothing at all. He was probably swindled by Eph. Of course he was swindled by Eph.

I decide something right now: I’m going to kill the rebels. I’m going to do this. It’s one less bullet to waste now that Skane’s not in the picture. I’ll take a horse, their weapons, and the provisions tucked away in the horses’ bulging saddle bags. Those saddle bags look well-stocked. Whatever’s in there is more than I have now. Maybe some rancid bacon, hardtack, and tea. I could live for a week on that. I feel conflicted about Skane but what’s it to me, really? I owe him nothing. Joel would leave him, too, especially after what he did to us. I can’t help him now. He was foolish to deal with Eph. He must not be a very smart man. If you’re foolish enough to deal with someone like Eph, it’s only a matter of time till your own stupidity and foolishness becomes your own executioner. 

I swing my submachine gun to combat-ready and and thumb to fully automatic, eager to fire. I don’t want a stand-off. I need to snipe them all in one clean ambush so I wait until they gather around the grave with fresh loads of rocks, and I inhale and exhale, and massage the trigger. Frrrak! Frrrak! Frrrak! I drill .40 S&W bursts into their shoulders. Visceral splatter fans in a gory arch around their bodies and they slump the ground in loose heaps as the gunshot rudely reverberates the timber. I break through the ridgeline and sweep the rebels. Dead, dead, and dead. Plus Skane, soon to be dead, buried deep below the ground. I go to the horses. These men must be well-connected to have these tall strong horses. Someone will be after them when they don’t return but I’ll be long gone.

I glance at Skane’s grave and sigh deep. Should I save him or forget about him? I think of the girl who I was when I first started drifting with Joel. The girl who stood for her principles at Sacred Way, who thought everyone deserved a proper burial. Having a grave to lay down your bones means a nice death. I make a little laugh at this because at least Skane’s got himself a proper burial. But I suppose I shouldn’t laugh. I mean, is it a nice death? He’s definitely panicking down there, feeling himself being slowly crushed to death. Suffocating, unable to move and unable to breathe. Everything cold, dark, and silent. Worms and centipedes squiggling against his skin, and crawling under his clothes and up his nose. This can’t be pleasant. This isn’t a nice way to die. Choose, idiot, choose! I choose. I go over to the grave and drag away the bodies of the rebels so I can clear the rocks. Once that's done, I take the shovel and scoop-off the topsoil. Then I lower myself into the grave and brush away handfuls of dirt till I uncover his head. His skin’s black with dirt but he’s very pale. I don’t smell death on him but I wonder if he’s already dead. What a dumb way to die. Just as I realize I might have to rebury him, his mouth opens wide and he gasps raucously. I grab at his shoulder and raise him into a sitting position. His good eye opens, wild and full of terror. He coughs his lungs clear and works himself into dry heaves. He retches—one, two, three times. Nothing comes up but some spittle. He breathes wildly and looks around like he’s seeing the world for the first time. Reborn, I suppose. “My God!” he yells. “Am I dying? Am I dead?”

I laugh and say, “I’ll rebury you with pleasure!” He looks at me directly. After a long moment, his face alights with recognition and wonder and his shoulders contract and spasm. It’s hard to tell if he’s laughing or crying but I think he’s doing both. Who could blame him?


	30. Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty

I hold Joel’s revolver in my hand, its familiar grip worn smooth by his steady fingers, and I cradle his rifle in my lap, comforted by its reassuring weight. How do I have Joel’s guns? I found them when we swept the rebels, stowed in one of their horses’ saddle bags. They’d been confiscated from Skane, which were in his possession since North Dakota. After we chose the two strongest horses, we galloped upland till long golden shafts of sun striated the mountaintops and we found shelter in a deserted barn of yellow pine.

He sits reclined against his saddle laid with a serape blanket in front of a small chip fire. He sips hot black tea from an aluminum mug and peels the spiny casings from the chestnuts we roasted in the ashes. We found the tea and mugs in one of the rebels’ saddle bags, along with some dried goat meat and tortillas. I study him across the fire as he eats. He’s diminished since I saw him last and minus one good eye. I tolerate his companionship because I find myself pleased to have found a familiar face and a sympathetic ear after such a long hard journey. I suppose I should pity him. He was terribly vain and now he looks like everyone else—wounded, scarred, and maimed. But now that I’m back in the company of other people, I realize how much I enjoyed the solitude of drifting alone. I was glad to be far-off from people and places. I felt like one of those biblical saints who gave-up their worldly possessions, and sought-out solitude and contemplation in the wilderness. I didn’t have to worry about boring or annoying anyone with my company. I had no one to nag or be nagged by and no one to complain to but myself. There was no one to tell me what to do, or what not to do.

Behind us, the horses munch buffalo grass clumps and sigh contentedly, and bats wildly careen the rafters. He clasps his drawn-up knee and smiles at me across the fire, and says, “So what’d you think of my performance? Brave? Foolish? Worthy of an encore?”

“Why the Lord’s Prayer?” I ask and he responds, “Death was inevitable so I took my chances between death and mercy—surrendered my weapons, surrendered my soul.” He takes a sip of tea and continues, “Can’t be a fluke running into you. When I saw you break through the dirt, it was like Venus rising from a spray of foam.” I don’t respond because I don’t know what he’s talking about but I still appreciate how he talks to me like I understand all his big words. He continues, “I’ve had a bad string of luck since Providence.” He touches his cheek below his eye patch and says, “Dice have been loaded against me. Hard luck follows bad.”

“What happened at the handoff?” I ask and he explains, “Something went wrong. Everything previously agreed to was negated. Falsehoods and pretenses. Swindled by barbarians who don't even know how to write their own names. Well, now I know. It cost me my eye but I know. A contract’s not even worth the paper it’s written on. The foulest dregs of civilization.” He touches his cheek again, his good eye haunted, and says, “How long did they keep you there?”

“It doesn’t exist,” I say and he looks at me inquisitively. “Gone,” I continue, “It’s all gone. We brought it down. Me and the men—the prisoners. Providence has fallen.”

“Eph?” he asks and I say, “Dead.” “How'd he die?” “One of the prisoners beat him to death.” He smiles broadly at this, his clean strong teeth flashing and his eye sparkling. He says, “Fate’s hand leads men to their own destruction. A fool’s his own executioner. Did they put up a good fight?”

“They ran like cowards,” I say and he answers, “Rats deserting a sinking ship. Fleas fleeing a drowning dog. What’s bred in the bone comes out in the flesh.” I scoff at this and say, “You’re a thug, just like the rest of them. Your veneer’s just a bit thicker.”

“No,” he responds in a scolding tone. “Your language is unmerited. Your words have gone further than you intended. Call me a fool if you’d like but not a thug. I’m a man of deep flaws—I’ll be the first to admit it. There are many temptations men of my power can’t resist—the rewards of my industry—but I’m a gentleman and a man of my word. I never lied to you and I never would. I did more than was my responsibility. I told you truthfully. I told you it’d be bad. It was bad, wasn’t it?”

“It was bad,” I say and reflexively touch the scar at the base of my skull through the stubbly regrowth. He throws back his head, looks at the sky, and exhales deep. “What an unspeakable fool man can be,” he says, his voice full of regret. He turns up the collar of his jacket and smiles genially, and asks, “Still on the trail of the Fireflies?” I don’t respond so he presses me, asking, “Thinking of settling? No, of course not. You’re not that type. Heading back East?”

“The Rock,” I say, and his muscles draw up a bit and he asks, “The Rock? Lith? How do you—”

“Do you know where it is?” I ask, interrupting him. So he knows about the Rock and he knows about Lith. He must know how to get there. “Why?” he asks and I say, “I’m going back.” “Back?” “For Joel.” “He’s there?”

“Do you know where it is?” I repeat and he asks, incredulously, “He’s alive?” so I repeat again, with emphasis, “Do you know where it is?” and he snaps back, “No one knows where it is! It’s a goddamn slab of concrete in the middle of this God-awful wilderness!” I don’t respond, taken back by his hostile venomous tone and his manner edged in impatience. After a moment, he continues, “You realize there’s little chance he’s still breathing?” so I ask, “How long does a bounty last?” and he says, “For a heavy one placed on his head? Ten years. If the dead body of Joel Miller could be delivered to the right people—ten years.”

The dead body of Joel Miller. He actually said this. These words should never, ever be uttered by anyone in this world. Joel’s not dead. I’d feel it in my bones if he were and I don’t feel it. I would’ve felt it. I know this as a fact. Survival’s in him—blood, breath, and bone. I say, “There’s no stopping him once he gets an idea in his head. He always gets his way in the end.”

“He’s a stubborn old fool,” he says and I answer, “He’s reasonable.” He continues, “I imagine you’ll always see him as a gentleman—a defender of virtue, a seeker of retribution, a just man seeking justice—and you’ll always see me as a brute.”

“If you’re right,” I say, “he’ll let you have your way. If he’s wrong, he’ll admit it and stand down. He only kills guilty men—men who had it coming. He never kills in cold blood or without good cause.” He scoffs at this and says, “His good cause got you into this mess and cost a lot of innocent lives. He’s condemned himself to death. He’s one of those wild men who’ll never be tamed till someone kills him. You’d be going back to the Rock for a dead man.” “He’s alive,” I say, my voice soft with tears. I cradle the rifle stock to my chest, warmed from the fire, and I swallow my tears and steady my trembling chin.

He sighs and fingers the brim of his Stetson. “It’s not terribly far from here,” he says, his voice magnanimous. “A couple days’ hard ride. You’d never find it on your own even if I told you where it was. Terra incognita. No trail. And even if there was one, it’s always shifting. The Devil himself couldn’t find his way through that tore-up country.” He looks at me directly and massages his chest, and continues, “It does a man’s heart good to look at you, you know?”

“Will you help me?” I ask and he says, “Shelter, warmth, and companionship. The most desirable things on a cold hard trail.” “Please,” I beg and he says, “You know I’m a man of my word. And you know what I want.” I think back to that night at the pool house. So much has happened since then but there’s still a feeling between us. I know he feels it, too. I pull to my feet and go over to him. He watches me with a gentle admiring smile. I stop in front of him and say, “Decent men take off their hats. It’s good etiquette.” He smiles broadly, sweeps down his Stetson, and presses it to his chest in a pardoning gesture. I reach down a hand and rake his hair in tender sweeps. He looks up at me and I see heaviness in his eyes. I know I’m right because he says, “I’ve done ungentlemanly things I’m not terribly proud of. It was a brutal thing to do. I’ve repented—bitterly. After such a long period of longing, it was like a terrible madness. Have you forgiven me?”

“You helped me see the true state of things,” I say. He slides up my t-shirt and kisses my belly, running his tongue into my navel. I make little sounds of encouragement, and he unbuttons my jeans and tugs them gently down my thighs. He lays me down on my back, climbs between my legs, and buries his head between my thighs.


	31. Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-One

Early morning light streams through the gable vents, and casts me and Skane in the barn’s shallow loft. I sit in his lap as he strops a straight razor against the tall shaft of his leather boot. It’s the same razor he used to shave me bare between my legs back in North Dakota. Last night, I asked him if I could try giving him a clean shave and he’d said yes, so he hands me the razor after he’s sharpened it to his liking. To get a close shave, I suppose I’ll have to remove his eye patch and I’m curious about what’s beneath it. Does he still have his whole eyeball? Is it gone and the lid’s fused shut? I want to know what it looks like but at the same time, I don’t. I gently touch the edge of it, but before I’m able to remove it, he catches my hand by the wrist and says, “Don’t,” in a stern tone. Fine. I’ll just shave around it. I wet his short beard with our breakfast brew-up dregs and ask him, “Does it hurt?” He laughs dryly and jokes, “My heart or my head?” so I say, “Your eye.”

“Not very much,” he says and I tell him, “You’re the same man as before.”

“It’s not your wound to bear.”

“What happened?” I ask and he sighs deep, and says, “Bullfighting. Is that romantic enough for you?” I don’t respond so he continues, “Do you think I’m horribly disfigured?” His injury’s made him terribly insecure so I answer him carefully, “You’re as beautiful as you were before.” He smiles contentedly at this. I steady him by the jaw and carve silver bristle from his lean face, and tell him, “We haven’t set the terms of our deal.”

“I dream of that house,” he says and I know he means the pool house in North Dakota. “Do you?” “No. Never.” This is a lie. That house is the first thing I think about when I wake-up and the last thing I think about before I fall asleep. Me and Joel in that house like we're the only two people left in the world. I think about his big cock and all the wonderful things it did to me. I’d give anything to just feel his cock again. Take it in my hand, fuck it between my legs, and squeeze it into my mouth. He continues, “I never thought anything so beautiful could still exist in this world.”

“Why are you talking about the past?” I ask. I clean the dirty blade on my jeans, steady his jaw, and slice bristle from his chin. He says, “Every castle needs a king and a queen, and two thrones.”

“Is that what you’re living for? A house you’ll never leave, full of stuff you’ll never use?”

“To have a good story to tell. And a good woman to tell it to.”

“No one good’s left in the world,” I say and he responds, “You’re a good woman. And I’m a true man.”

“I’m ready to fight. And to die honorably. Join me.”

“Is that your plan?” he asks and I say, “I’ve got courage. And guns.” He laughs at this and says, “Courage alone can’t defeat an army a million times your own strength. You’d be dead before you could even draw your gun. Lith’s Fireflies are men of war. They lie in wait and open fire at the first sign of trouble.” I don't respond and he continues, “Whatever happens, don’t run. They’d cut you to little pieces, finish you off in a whiff of grapeshot. There wouldn’t even be enough of you to fill a cigar box. It’d be a war to the finish. You understand the odds, don’t you?”

“They’d be better with you,” I say and he says, “No. That’s a young man’s game. My blood’s thick in my veins. My hair’s grey and my teeth are soft. I’m half-blind. My mutilated face’s turned me into a horror. I deserve a stately retirement for a noble life before the graveyard. Not to be gunned down in some lonesome field by savages.”

“If you go down, it’ll be quick and painless, and you’ll die at my side. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

“I’d rather be a coward for a minute than a dead man for the rest of my life. Besides, I like my sport with a touch of vengeance. A good grudge. A score to settle. That’s his dream—dying with his back against the wall and his knife in his enemy’s throat.”

“I’m just asking for a fearless man to back me up and help me stand-up for what’s right,” I say. “I’m not asking you to run any risks I wouldn’t run myself.” He scoffs at this and says, “Don’t ask me to fight his battles.”

“It’s his fight as much as mine,” I say and he says, “I won’t fight yours, either,” so I say, “Then we go our separate ways.” I hand him the razor and rise from his lap. I go over to the gable vent and look out over the open fields washed watery pink in sunrise. Behind me, I hear him pull to his feet with a conciliatory sigh. A moment later he comes over and stands at my side, and says, “A fine morning, don’t you think?” I don’t respond so he continues, “Perfect weather for a race.” I don’t know what he’s insinuating so I look at him inquisitively and he says, “A smart man knows to gamble when his luck’s returned. We’ll race for it. On the horses. Whoever crosses the barn first, wins.”

“Wins what?” I ask and he says, “If you win, I’ll take you to the end of the road and fight by your side. If I win, you come with me. You have a lifelong list of things you want to do and I have the means to give it to you. I can indulge you and you can make me feel like it’s worthwhile.”

“Where’ll we go?” I ask and he says, “Anywhere. Somewhere unclaimed. It’s easier to find a new home than to clean an old one.”

“That’s a barter for the rest of my life.”

“Life, love, and hope are brief. Only death’s forever. Are you game?”

–––––––

“Unlucky streak’s over,” Skane says, his voice buoyant and his good eye blazing victory. I yell back at him, “You killed your fucking horse!”

“It’s not my fault—it was his misfortune.”

“You played dirty!”

“Don’t be an ungracious loser," he says. "I find it terribly unattractive.”

We sit shoulder-to-shoulder reclined against a saddle. _A_ saddle. Just one. My eyes water tears and it’s not from the plump quail roasting over the cooking fire. They’re tears of frustration and anger.

After leaving the saddles in the barn, we raced our sweaty horses bareback down the road in a maddening gallop. Skane drove his horse fast at my side and I whipped mine into a full-on throttle, taking the lead with the barn bursting rapidly into view. Right as we came up to it, Skane kicked his heels vigorously, tossed the reins, and pulled ahead. There was no doubt he crossed the barn first.

Snorting pain and fury, his horse stumbled, neighed piercingly, and cartwheeled to the ground. Skane was thrown clear. I swerved-in beside him and we watched his horse struggle in the dust, unable to rise, his sides heaving wild breath. It was clear his leg was broken. Skane had no choice but to put him down so he stamped his shotgun between his eyes and fired twice. Just as my heart broke for the poor beast, something caught my eye: along its sweat-streaked withers I noticed Skane’s fixed blade, sunk to the hilt. What was his knife doing there, I thought to myself. A second later, I gasped as I put it together: he stabbed his horse to urge it on! He cheated! What kind of man does that?

Skane pulls the quail from the flames by its feet, lays it over a bark rind, and carves it with his blade. He lays it in front of me but I make no effort to take it because I won’t eat. I can’t. “Eat,” he says. “You’re too beautiful to be sulky and too thin to skip a meal.” “I’m not hungry,” I say, cross my arms over my chest, and stare into the fire.

“Ever had flamingo?” he asks and I don’t respond, so he continues, “My parents owned a villa in Italy, overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea. It was one of those crumbling medieval castles, once its own principality, roosted on a mountain ledge, polished to splendor during the Renaissance and driven to neglect during the Risorgimento, with rugged immense stone walls. They’d bought it for a pittance from faded nobility reduced to such poverty and misfortune, they couldn’t even afford a single couch to furnish it. The salons were hung with oils of dead ancestors that’d been sold and replaced with cheap copies—all the original church documents were forged. The rooms were vast with dark oak beams running through the ceilings, infested with termites. They gutted it, expanded it out to the stone barn, put in a pool, and nurtured the vineyards, the wine crypts, the stables, and the fountains. The gardens led down to a private bay where friends would anchor their yachts and drop-in for lunch. We always had the table set for thirty even if fifteen showed-up.

“Our head gamekeeper was a raw-boned Tuscan. He cared for the exotic animals—flamingos, ocelots, armadillos, and kangaroos. I always wondered: did they escape? Starve to death? Devour each other whole? Get roasted-up by the villagers? Were they crossbred by black market breeders? Are there herds of wild kangaroos and flamingos roaming Tuscany?” He laughs dryly and continues, “I used to bottle-feed the joeys. I’d wrap them in my mother’s chinchilla and fox capes, even in the summer. They were always cold. She loved the flamingos. She’d sit by the fountains and watch them for hours.”

“What happened to her?” I ask, and he shrugs and says, “I never knew where she was, which continent she was on. Only the house managers knew.”

“The who?” I ask and he responds, “The house managers and their household staff. It sounded like a lot until you saw the house. The maids, the chefs, the gardeners, the drivers, the pilots, the stable hands, the electricians, the bodyguards, the security detail. I never knew how many there were, never even met half of them.”

“Do you think of her often?” I ask and he says, “Not very much.”

“What was she like?”

“Like everyone else’s. After a while, I was sent away with the servants to St. Moritz. I saw more of them and the maids than my parents.”

“I never knew mine,” I say, “never knew my mother's love. Her absence meant a lot to me when I was little but not anymore. The only thing I remember was realizing she was never coming back, and how lonely and miserable and abandoned it made me feel. I can’t remember anything else about her.”

“Your father?” he asks and I say, “I never asked and no one’s ever volunteered any information,” so he answers flippantly, “You picked a poor replacement.”

I could get mad at this. I really could. I could lash back at him for slandering Joel, but I don't. “He protected me like a father,” I say. “He’s the only parent I’ve ever known. He made me everything I am, taught me all he knew. No one’s ever been to me what he is and no one ever will.” A tear runs down my cheek and I make no attempt to wipe it away. Please forgive me, Joel, I say to myself. I made a foolish bet with a foolish man. It wasn’t my fault. I made the bet in good faith but the man I bet against was a bad sportsman. What can I do? I gave my word. You taught me it was important to keep my word.

He sighs deep and says, “Ellie, look at me,” so I look at him directly. He continues, “I’m a man of my word and a man of diplomacy. I have my reputation and I maintain it. I don’t have a habit of making promises, but when I do, I keep them and I expect the same. Let’s be clear: I won that race.” He drops his good eye and says, “But I made the gamble in bad faith. The win wasn’t true. The wager was false. It wasn’t in the spirit of true sportsmanship—competition with fair play. The frenzy of winning overtook me and warped my judgment. I’m under great obligation to you. You saved me from certain death.” His mouth pulls into a thin white line and his chest spasms. What’s he doing, is what I’m thinking. He draws a hand across his mouth and wails misery into it. He’s crying! “I was dead!” he sobs and heaves a deep wet wail. “I was already dead! And you came! You brought me back to life!” I feel great pity for him so I gather him into my arms. He buries his head against my chest and clutches at me desperately, sobbing. “Why are you crying?” I ask and he says, “I’m ashamed,” his voice thin in tears.

“Of what?”

“For you to see me like this.”

“Crying?”

“Broken. Scarred. Filthy. A horror.” He pulls away from me and pulls-out a silk handkerchief from his pocket. I recognize it as one he took from the pool house. He wipes his good eye and his nose, and exhales one long shuddering breath. He says, “I’m indebted to you for life. You saved mine. I’ll cancel your first debt but the second one remains. I’ll take you to the end of the road but you’ll fight alone. I’m not ready to die. My life’s my own. Besides, I don’t want you unless you come with me of your own free will, not because you’re compelled to. I won’t be anyone’s fool.” He digs around his hair and pushes it back from his forehead. “Will you at least promise to miss me a little bit?” he asks and laughs good-naturedly. I smile back at him, and he frames my face and kisses my forehead. Fact is, I’ll never forget him. He’s left a deep impression on me. I’m pleased to have met him and pleased to have run into him again. He pulls his blade from the quail and offers me the handle. “Go on—eat.” I take the knife from him and eat, digging at the quail flesh. I ask him between bites, “Tell me more about your mother. What was she like?”

His breath catches in his chest and he says, “She was beautiful. Immaculate, mannered, and groomed to the last hair. She trailed glamour like a cloak. She never looked wrong and never overdid anything, and she was never conventional. She dressed in a way that made you stare, took your breath away, and filled you with great envy. She had many demands, like all great women of her standing—privileges—and she was deserving of them all.”

“What did she do?” I ask and he continues, “She managed my father’s art collections and travelled according to season, and his businesses and interests: Switzerland in the winter; Paris in the spring; Italy, the French Riviera, and Monte Carlo in the summer; and London and New York in the fall.” He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a dark leather wallet, and removes a small black-and-white portrait of a woman’s head shot in profile. He shows it to me and she’s the most beautiful woman I ever saw. She’s got a noble nose and an elegant jaw. Her sleek dark hair’s been lifted from her temples and plaited into a thick braid overhanging an impossibly-long graceful neck. She looks like one of those old movie stars. He rubs the photo tenderly with his thumb and says, “She had a husky voice. A deep mezzo. I don’t remember what it sounded like.”

“What was your dad like?” I ask and he says, “I didn’t see much of him. I was usually brought down and shown-off to his dinner guests. His presence meant little to me and I expect it always will. He was urbane, well-tailored, and self-assured. His wit was doled-out for special occasions. He spent three months of the year on skis.”

“It must be really hard living like this.”

“You make it easier,” he says. He draws me into his chest, tucks my head beneath his chin, and holds onto me tight. Bellies full of quail, we watch the popping embers of the fire until we get sleepy and prepare for bed-down. He rakes-up the embers, tosses-in long-burn green logs, and lays the serape blankets over a bed of fragrant fir boughs. We bed-down with our limbs entwined. Across the fire, the horse strips bark and munches bunch grass, sighing contentedly. A fox barks across the hilltops and the wind rustles the firs.

“Where will you go?” I ask him and he says, “Overseas.”

“Do you think your family’s still alive?”

“My kind always survives. They seek-out a nice comfortable place to lay low when there’s trouble and they come right back when it’s all over.” He takes my face into his hand and I feel him heavy with thoughts. He says, “I hardly expect we’ll ever see each other again but I hope we will. If you ever need me, please come find me.”


	32. Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Two

It’s a very tall mountain, the tallest in the range. Every side rises precipitously to the top with steep inclines and treacherous gullies. Every imaginable obstacle trips you up—frigid mountain streams, slippery rocks, and thick briars. Once you reach the top, it’s shaped like a bowl and carpeted in long grass. In the middle, there’s a small calm lake and beyond the lake is a hill, which rises to a crest covered in tall rankly grass. That’s where you find the Rock, backed into a small brow, its concrete-slab entrance defended by a marksman team.

I would’ve never found this place without Skane’s guidance. If he had pointed to this exact mountain and said, ‘Ellie, you’ll find the Rock at the top of this mountain,’ I still wouldn’t have found it. He knew this place and knew exactly how to circumvent Devil’s Promenade, the narrow crooked trail that connected the last plateau to the top, swarming with prowler duty guards.

I lay in wait, proned-out behind a small boulder overlooking the Rock’s entrance backed into the brow. Behind me, a fresh patch of dirt marks the spot where I buried Joel’s rifle, pistol, revolver, and watch for safekeeping—if I make it out alive. I know how foolish it was to come back without a plan but there were too many variables and unknowns. Is Lith still alive? Is Joel still here or was he sent back to Salt Lake City? Are they still looking for a cure? If Lith’s dead, there must be a new leader and maybe this new leader will be sympathetic? A new leader would find a new cause, even abandoning the idea of a cure altogether. If they want to bargain, I’m game. I’d join their cause and say the oath in exchange for Joel’s freedom. They’re just words, after all. I’d join, and wait till I could defect and find him. If that’s not possible, I’ll offer my life in exchange for his. I’d do this for him because I’m ready to die. I’d make the choice to die and it’d be easy because life without him wouldn’t be worth living. This isn’t what he taught me. Fight and survive, is what he always says. Find something to live for and find something to fight for. If you believe in something—anything—you can live forever. That’s the problem. He’s what I believe in. I can’t live without him. I’d choose to die, knowing it wouldn’t be the last of us.

With this in mind, I cut through the ridgeline and head straight for the Rock. I raise my hands over my head in a gesture of surrender. I grip them together, shaking them, to show I’m not armed and I mean no harm. The guards spot me and the whole atmosphere changes. Their harsh commands roll across the distance. They rush toward me in long purposeful strides, menacing and urgent, with their rifles targeting my chest. I’m seized by strong hands, hustled through the Rock’s imposing blast doors, and taken down a steel staircase cast in sickly fluorescent light. At the end of a long hallway, I’m led into a long rectangular room. The command center, is what I’m thinking, because there are topographical maps, charts, and whiteboards all over the walls. A large table fills the room. I’m shoved into one of its plastic chairs bolted to the floor. The soldiers surround me with grim faces. They mean to kill me at the slightest provocation.

After a long moment, the door swings open and a large figure stands in the doorway. It’s Lith. She’s alive. I see her and realize, of course she’s alive. She’d survive anything. She comes over with a knot of Fireflies at her back and looks at me with flat dispirited eyes. She’s in a dark hunting coat and britches. Her hair’s been pulled back into a long braid with a dark scarf pulled low over her head, down past her ears. One side of her face is scarred. The flesh is shiny and pink—burned. I suppose from the car crash. It doesn’t matter. These are scars she’ll have until she dies, a reminder of the ambush and that I left her for dead. It’s the first time I’ve thought about this. It’s a very dishonorable thing to leave someone for dead unless you actually wish them dead. I left her for dead and she knows this. She knows I wished her dead. She doesn’t speak so I do, saying, “You want me,” and she answers, “I want you.”

“I did you wrong but here I am,” I continue. “Do what you want with me but let him go.”

“You don’t know what you’re asking, do you?” she says with a sneer so I continue, “He’s of no use to you. Let’s work something out.”

“The life of a wanted man’s never certain,” she says and I add, “My life for his.”

“You’re too late,” she says so I ask, “Too late?” What’s she mean, too late? Was he taken to Salt Lake City and if so, how long ago? If not Salt Lake City, was he taken to another Firefly HQ, and if so, when? She continues, “His selfishness was his fatal mistake,” so I ask for clarification, “What did you say?” because I’m still not understanding what’s she saying. Fatal mistake? I don’t understand anything she’s saying at all. “What?” I repeat and she answers, “He’s dead.” “What?" I ask. “What have you done with him?”

“Gone,” she says. “He’s dead. Dead and gone.” I gasp small jagged breath. Seized in nausea, I spring from my chair. The walls bulge and recede, and the floor keels unevenly. I stare blindly, pale and trembling, seized in dread. It can’t be true. It can’t be true. He can’t be dead. I would’ve known if he were dead. I would’ve felt it. I would’ve known it in my heart. He can’t be dead. I stare blindly, frozen to the spot, my limbs trembling and weak. Silent tears course my cheeks. “I’m the one you want!” I yell and I’m overcome by a wave of great sorrow. I start to sob wet sloppy tears. She looks at me with disgust and yells, “Save your tears! He never cared for you! He never loved you! He acted on his own failures, without shame or principle. A greedy covetous self-absorbed man. If he ever possessed a conscience, it was abandoned long ago.”

“He's got nothing to do with it!” I yell at her and she yells back, “Stop your nonsense! He lived only to please himself, knew nothing of sacrifice or selflessness! A corrupter and a destroyer. His whole life was centered on a single purpose: fierce hatred and revenge. Whoever he hadn’t killed, he drove away. You learned the truth a long time ago: he took all and gave nothing. You could’ve been the way of evolution. Your goodness for the good of the world. He had one shot—one good great deed from a lifetime of evil but he condemned the world to death. He sacrificed immortality to protect his own ego. He robbed the world and its children of a future—a death sentence, barren and suicidal. You’ve lured yourself to your own death coming back for him. Death’s at the end of it.”

My blood ices with the understanding she means to kill me. I won’t live to see another day and my life will be taken in vain. No sacrifice, no cure. Nothing. An ignoble inglorious death. I figured we’d come to an agreement. I figured Joel was still alive and I’d trade my life for his, and I’d have a final goodbye. I ask her, “What about your obligation? Affairs of honor?” and she responds, “This ruined country doesn’t need you anymore,” so I ask, “The weapons? The reward?” and she responds, “My reward’s the satisfaction of possessing something no one else possesses. Of killing something no one else can kill.” I utter a small choked sob. If only I’d gotten here sooner. I’m sorry I failed you, Joel. There’ll never be anyone else. Never. No one can ever take your place. You know that, Joel, don’t you?

She turns to the men and tells them to sit me back down. They grab me and shove me back into my chair. She rummages through a stack of charts on the table till she finds a large weathered map of North America. It’s deeply worn with hand-drawn symbols over the capital cities. She traces the Eastern coastline and taps a worn discolored spot marked with a skull-and-crossbones symbol drawn over Boston. She says, “There used to be a well-known port outside of Boston—Port Adams—on the coast in an old stone Gothic church with crumbled spires and a vaulted charnel house past the cemetery. It doesn’t exist anymore. It hasn’t existed for eighteen years, for as long as you’ve been alive.”

Eighteen years? But I’m sixteen. I tell her this and she says, “That’s what they told you.” I look at her with a million questions gathering-up behind my eyes and she says, “We bought you two more years.” My lips part soundlessly. I fumble for words but I’m unable to speak. After a moment, I’m able to put it together: she means the draft. Conscription at eighteen-years-old, required of all QZ citizens for mandatory military service. Even if I’d been a conscientious objector, I would’ve been required to register. If I’d remained in the QZ, I would’ve spent my teenage years waiting around for my number to be called for a desk job or combat duty. But what do the Fireflies have to do with my draft? Before I can ask, she continues, “One day, a young woman visited Port Adams. Her clothes were new and neat. She looked around and saw filth and illness everywhere. Unsanitary and inhumane conditions. Sleeping quarters were metal cots with no mattresses, packed side-by-side. There wasn’t a nurse or a doctor in sight. The eyes of every man, woman, and child had that same bleak look common to ports: hard-lined faces, grieving and fretful. Children were waifs, thin and pale, dwarfed and crippled. Men were feeble and useless with age.

“A crowd gathered around her and she handed-out supplies: soap, towels, blankets, shoes, milk, socks, razors, and medicine. A pacification mission. Before she left, she stood in the center of the sanctuary and spoke to the crowd, ‘Take a good look at yourselves. You’re miserable and wretched, living in squalor and filth. You’ve survived but you’re not safe. Your men are crippled, old, and weak. They’re unable to fight, unable to defend you. Your children aren’t safe. Give them to me.’ There was a great disturbance in the crowd. She went on, ‘I’ll take them to a safe place where they can live, learn, and play in peace, free of disease and infection. They’ll have sunlight and fresh air, green fields and flowers to play in, and fresh milk to drink—as much wholesome food as they want. It’s for the good of the world and the good of humanity. To save mankind. It’s just a matter of time before the cordyceps virus rages through these walls. You won’t be able to keep yourselves or your children safe. Give them to me. I can save them. I can keep them safe.’

“The crowd grew angry. ‘We’ll never give you our children!’ they said, so she asked them, ‘How could you refuse my offer? If you had the means, wouldn’t you send your children somewhere safe?’ The crowd grew distrustful and suspicious. ‘Why do you want our children?’ they said. ‘What are you gonna do with them: buy them and sell them? If you want children so badly, lay down with a man and have them yourself!’

“The woman wouldn’t be deterred. ‘This horrible place has ruined you, has made you distrustful. I come here offering to save your children and you accuse me of bad faith? I don’t want your children! I wanna save them, to save humanity. You’ll be slaughtered in your sleep. Your children’ll be ripped from your arms. Your sons’ll be sold into slavery. Your daughters’ll be raped and killed.’ The crowd grew angrier. ‘We’re not giving you our children! Stop asking! If we die, we die together!’ They’d had enough. They started to walk away. The woman yelled after them, ‘Don’t sentence your children to death! Let them rise!’ Out of the crowd came a young woman, pale and thin, holding a newborn baby in her arms. Every eye turned to her and the church fell silent. It was your mother. ‘I’ll give you my daughter,’ she said, and she kissed you and put you in my arms.”

My whole body breaks out in cold sweat and my limbs tremble. Lith continues, “Brave and beautiful deeds are often the simplest. With your mother’s blessing, I took you from that place of certain death and delivered you to safe harbor. A couple days before, Marlene and I were patrolling the coast when we heard your mother’s screams, long in labor. We helped her deliver you, stayed with her through the night, and delivered you both to Port Adams. She knew her fate. The military had been closing-in on ports for months. It was only a matter of time till ports were bombed to rubble—hundreds of women, children, and elderly slaughtered outright. The Firefly stronghold where we placed you kept falling under attack so we smuggled you into Boston and engaged Marlene to look after you. Your mother’s bravery saved you, could’ve saved humanity if he hadn’t trespassed.”

I’m overcome with a new understanding of my mother was and it chills me to the core. She left me in the arms of a stranger! A stranger from a fifth column! How could a mother give-up her newborn child to a stranger? “She abandoned me,” I say. “Into the arms of a stranger. She gave me life but that’s all. He was more of a guardian to me than she ever was. He protected me. He kept me safe!” “What had to be done, you could’ve done yourself,” she says. “You were born under the open sky, at the edge of the ocean, with the stars as your roof. You passed the first days of your life in squalor. You were an orphan before you could even hold up your head!”

“My life’s worth nothing without him!” I yell. Her lips pull into a thin white line and she shouts, “Traitor!” She sweeps back an arm and lashes my face with the back of her hand. I stumble backwards to the floor, dazed and reeling from the blow, my eyes stinging bitter angry tears. “The hurtful resentments of an ungrateful child!” she yells. “All of your mother’s strength and courage coursing through your blood, and you defend the false one! A dejected despondent man sunk in the depths of fury! He showed you the world but only as he saw it: deceitful, willful, and selfish! He stalked this earth and lashed out with venom. His poison’s seeped into you! It poisons everything you see!”

I pull to my feet, square before her, and yell, “He dies and I die with him! And I swear, you’ll die, too!” I swing out to hit her but before the blow can land, the soldiers draw back my arms. She laughs derisively as I thrash against them. I hate her with burning incendiary rage. I hate her. I hate the Fireflies. They took the one thing in this world that meant everything to me. “You started a blood feud,” she says, “burdened yourself with a lifetime foe. You’ve brought your own death with you coming back. I’ve already saved you twice. Now I’m sending you to join him.” A portentous whisk fills the room as she unsheathes her machete. I squeeze my eyes shut and anticipate a quick death.


	33. Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Three

Boom! The door bursts open with blinding deafening clattering gunfire. Lith and the Fireflies erupt into red mist, their bodies folding lifelessly to the ground in loose heaps. A shadowed figure hovers the threshold momentarily before storming into the room. “Ellie!” a voice yells—Bishop’s voice! “Are you hit?” he asks. A dozen Providence men stream through the door behind him, and flank him with their assault rifles and submachine guns raised to combat-ready. What the hell are they doing here? How’d they find me? None of it matters. They’re too late. Joel’s dead and it would’ve been better if they’d left me for dead, too. “Are you insane?” I yell at him. “You’re gonna get yourself killed!”

He laughs and says, “Then we’re gonna have a hell of a lotta fun till we die!” Beyond the door, the hallway explodes with dueling artillery fire, muffled explosions, stampeding boots, and colliding weight. Bishop sweeps a dead soldier and hands me his load out, an AR-15 and a .45 caliber pistol. “Don’t worry,” he says and cuffs my shoulder reassuringly, “We ain’t leaving without him.” I choke back a sob and say, “We’re too late.” “What do you mean, too late?” “He’s dead.” “You seen it?” he asks and I shake my head, no. He scoffs at this and says, “How do you know she didn’t frame you up?” I think about this and realize he’s absolutely right. I would’ve felt it in my bones if Joel were dead. He continues, “He’s gotta be here somewhere, and if not, we’ll scour heaven and earth till we find him!” He turns to the men and commands, “Scatter and hunt!” and they stream out into the hallway. I tuck my pistol to my waistband, swing the AR-15 to combat-ready, and follow them, my boots skidding the blood-slicked floor. The hallway carries the signs of the massacre. Slaughtered Fireflies slump against the walls, littered in spent cartridges and empty shotshells, cut down by the Providence fire team. They jog past me with exuberant smiles and tensed hurried faces.

I kick through blast doors and call out for Joel. I have to fight the impulse to race wildly from room to room—fury would only confuse me—so I try to go about it methodically. I head to the infirmary to find Candler, the last person I know who saw Joel alive. When I get there, the floor is pooled in blood. Patients lay dead in their bunks, slaughtered right where they’d laid. I don’t want to look in the bunks but I have to. None are Joel. None are him. I look in Candler’s office but he’s not there so I head for the lab and right before I take a step into the room, I stumble to a halt. It’s swarming with Fireflies! I duck behind Candler’s desk and watch on. 

One of the soldiers stacks blood collection trays on the counter. Another pulls folders from file cabinets and dumps them into industrial tilt trucks, while another incinerates them above the Bunsen burners. Evacuation protocol, I suppose. I find Candler at the far wall. He stands at a double-sink console with his back to me and says morosely, “A lifetime of research down the drain.” A jar-headed soldier yells at him, “Shut up and move!” and he hurls a stack of trays into the sink, shards cascading the backsplash. “You know the drill! Operation Scorched Earth. Move!” Candler collects labware from a cabinet and tosses them into a large trash can. He scoffs and says facetiously, “Impenetrable! Fifteen-ton blast doors, two hundred inch-thick ceilings, a hundred inch-thick walls—”

“You’d be eaten alive before your first sunrise,” the jar-headed soldier interrupts him and another one yells, “Maybe if you’d spent less time jerking-off!” Another adds, “Or sucking your own dick!” and another laughs and adds, “Or teaching them how to do it for you.” He gestures at a row of narrow closets along the wall, each affixed with a medical chart. Candler’s clinical trial patients, I suppose. If so, they’ll have to be executed. Even I know this.

“Breen!” the jar-headed soldier yells to a tall blond soldier whose name I suppose is Breen. “Bios! Bag ‘em and line ‘em up!” He tosses a keychain to Breen. Breen catches it and unlocks the doors, leading out prisoners, one by one. He leads them to the far wall and backs them against it, shoulder to shoulder, execution style. All of them are in blackout hoods and identical uniforms—dark sweatshirts and sweatpants—with their ankles and wrists bound in handcuffs. One of the prisoners moans anguish beneath his hood and starts begging for his life, which builds to panicked hysterical wails. Breen unsheathes his pistol, aims it at the wailing prisoner’s hood, and fires. Pack! The prisoner folds to the ground and a dark wet stain blossoms his hood as he bleeds-out. The two prisoners at his side panic and stumble away in an attempt to escape. One trips over his leg irons and the other runs haphazardly around the room until he crashes into a lab table. Pack! Pack! Pack! Pack! Breen cuts them both down with his pistol until they lay dead over pools of blood. Candler surveys the slaughter with wild eyes and yells, “For God’s sake, Breen!” and Breen answers, “Friends of yours?” Candler goes over to the last surviving prisoner, shields him from Breen with his own body, and says, “My last request. One last cigarette. He served me well.” Breen considers this for a moment and says, “Hustle. Time’s up.”

With a trembling hand, Candler pulls a slim tin case from his pocket, takes out a cigarette, and lights it from the neck of a Bunsen burner. He squints from the smoke and takes a couple deep drags before dropping a hand over the prisoner’s shoulder and offering him the cigarette. The prisoner answers, “Don’t smoke,” his voice muffled through the hood. That voice. That familiar voice. It can’t be. It can’t be. It can’t be. “I’d offer you whisky,” Candler continues with a little laugh, “but that’s long gone. I wish there were some other way. You’ve served me well, never wanted for anything. We came so close.” He takes a final drag from his cigarette and flicks it to the floor. Breen notices and starts making his way over, his pistol poised for the final executions. I swing-up my AR-15 and target his shoulder. As he raises his pistol to the prisoner’s hood, I massage the trigger and pull it rearward. Frrrak! Breen’s shoulders explode, and he jerks forward and collapses into a heap, bright blood splatter decorating the walls.

The remaining soldiers scatter for cover, shouting rough commands. Frrrak! Frrrak! Frrrak! I snipe two between the shoulders as they flee. I flatten against the wall as staccato salvo slams into the room and rips it apart. Frrrak! Frrrak! Frrrak! Chunks of concrete shower the floor and bookshelves crash down all around me till there’s nothing but silence. Every muscle in my body strains to listen. Out of the corner of my eye, a large dark form rushes toward me and I fire in its direction. Frrrak! Frrrak! Dead weight hits the floor with a dull thud followed by silence. Wet gurgles sigh past rattling lungs and continue at steady intervals. Whoever I shot is slowly dying.

I stalk into the room sweeping my barrel over the carnage till I spot the prisoner. He’s alive, sitting slumped against the wall, trembling uncontrollably. I go over to him and rip aside the black-out hood. “God!” I yell, my voice choked-out. “Joel!” It’s Joel! He doesn’t look at me. His eyes are fixed on my hands. He gathers one of them and presses it against his cold cheek. My whole body trembles and sweat breaks-out over my skin in waves. Tears roll down his cheeks but he doesn't make a sound.

“It’s you, Joel,” I say, controlling my voice with extraordinary willpower. “It’s me, Ellie,” he answers in a voice too thin to carry inflection. “They said you were dead,” I say and he responds, “You didn’t believe them, did you?” so I say, “How could I live if you were dead?” He starts to cry weak thin sobs and it’s terrible. It’s a terrible sound to hear. Joel, the man who never cries. In the years I’ve known him, I think of all the times he should’ve cried and he didn’t. All the sadness, frustration, anger, and fear he felt, but he never cried. Not till now. I want to take him in my arms and hold him but there’s no time. There’s no time to cry. We have to move. “Don’t cry, Joel,” I say. “I’m not dead and neither are you. But we will be if we don’t move.” I start pulling away but he won’t let go of me. He tightens his grip and says, “Don’t leave me.” 

“Let go of me, Joel,” I say and pry-back his hands. “We’ve gotta move. You’re safe.” “Don’t leave me.” “You’re safe.” “Don’t leave.” “I’ve got you now.” I manage to loosen his grip and I scavenge Candler’s pockets till I find the deluxe master key. I uncuff Joel’s wrists and ankles, and pull him from the floor. We make our way to the door and he stumbles in a shuffling gate. His back’s bent, his shoulders are stooped, and his arms hang loosely from his body. He must’ve been locked in that closet that whole time.

We break into the hallway, and run right into Bishop and Tigerman. They brace-up Joel and ferry him out of the Rock till we hit the grassy crest where Providence men are busy sweeping slain Fireflies under the late afternoon sun. Bishop brandishes an M67 grenade in his hand and addresses the men, “Gentlemen, I’m sending the call up the ladder! Who brought the heat?” Men gather around him and flash grenades in their blood-stained hands. “Send up your best relief!” Bishop continues. Tigerman digs an M67 from his plate carrier and yells, “Put me in, coach!” and Bishop replies, “Hard and straight—fan 'em batters!” He looks at me and says, “Take him to the ridge. We’re about to open up the gates of Hell!”

I brace-up Joel and we hustle to the ridgeline. The men snap into a line and start heading for the Rock’s entrance. “Here it comes!” Bishop yells, his voice echoing across the distance. “Get ready! On three…two…one! Let ‘er rip!” Lobbed grenades drum against the Rock’s blast doors. A moment later, the silence is broken by the riotous footfalls and hollers of sprinting men seeking cover. Boom! The air splits apart with a hollow thudding roar and the sound reverberates across the mountains in overlapping thunder. Boom! A vivid white flash breaks over the sky. The ground jolts, lifts, and sways, and an enormous explosion pierces my ears and thwacks my chest. We dive prone and cradle our heads with our arms as smoke roars past us, and rocks and clods of grass cascade the earth. Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! A series of quick concussions roll back in deafening detonations and a chain of booming thunder rumbles far-off aftershocks. 

A breathless calm settles over us. Men gather around us and help us to our feet. Their faces are tensed, and streaked in blood, sweat, and soot. Where the Rock once stood, smoke billows black and red through a thick haze, and flame tongues roar and crackle. I head to the spot where I buried Joel’s load-out and dig everything from the ground. Now to get out of here. We start looking for their horses and find their empty corrals, which leads us to large stables backed into the rock wall. The Fireflies who fled took the halest studs and the hardiest tack-ups so the stock’s down to a handful of thin narrow skittish Saddlebreds. Hard keepers eye us nervously from the stalls. No matter. Men double-up and judiciously divide the remaining tack-up.

I pick a neat black Saddlebred stallion with a bullet scar across his hide and a white star, and fit him with a bitless bridle harness, the only tack-up left. Joel grabs the horse’s mane, takes a running leap, and throws himself limply over its back. He offers me his hand and I use his foot as a step, mounting in front of him. Riding two-up with my hands on the reins, we canter the plateau burnished in the setting sun alongside mounted men cantering toward Devil’s Promenade. I spot Bishop on a halted Warmblood so I pull up to him and halt. He’s arguing with Tigerman, who stands at the horse’s side, struggling to mount. Bishop nudges the stirrup with his foot and says to him, “Put in your damned foot and jump!” “I’ve never been on one of these before,” Tigerman replies, and Bishop laughs and says, “And this poor mare’s never had one of you on her, either!” “I don’t even know which end of the horse is which!” Tigerman says, and slips his foot into the stirrup and mounts sloppily behind Bishop.

Bishop looks at me with weighted eyes and says, “I reckon it’s time to say so long. You’d better come look me up. My kids’ll be expecting you.” He smiles at Joel and says to him, “The Rock of Ages, too! God’ll reward you for your endeavors.” “Much obliged to you,” Joel says and Bishop replies, “May God be with you and bless you both a long, long time. So long!” He gathers the reins freshly and says to Tigerman, “Walking ain’t shit. You’re about to feel real freedom!” He tosses the reins and spurs the horse into a full-on gallop, its hooves drumming the earth. Tigerman squeals with outstretched arms as the horse rockets the knoll. “Freedom!” he yells, his voice bent in distance. “I’m free! I’m free! I’m free!”

I set our horse to a trot and we head down Devil’s Promenade. We sway rhythmically along the steep descent, bent into the horse’s neck and clutching his mane. He picks his way slowly and carefully. It’s clear he’s made the sharp descent plenty of times before. Joel’s body trembles behind me. His right hand rests on my knee often, squeezing it reassuringly. He’s alert but weak. I can tell he revels in his newfound freedom, drawing deep draughts of air.

We exit the mountain onto graveled foothills as a soft twilight descends. The western skies flush red, fade yellow, and turn purple. We merge onto the crumbled asphalt and I halt the horse below a road sign. Interstate 25. I-25. South. El Paso. I twist in the saddle so I can look at Joel and I ask him, “What are you thinking?” He looks at me and says, “Same as you,” and we share a knowing smile. I gather the reins freshly and cluck the horse into a spirited lively gallop, bright starshine streaking overhead.


	34. Chapter Thirty-Four

The New Mexico plains shimmer in the afternoon heat. We crossed into the territory a couple days ago and we’re headed east along the Rio Grande shallows, its pebbled banks dotted with prickly cacti.

We dismount on a silty outcropping and stretch our stiff sore legs. I feel short, dirty, and dehydrated. I lead the horse to the shade and he browses, his tail swishing idly. Joel had very bad saddle sores the first week so every day I made sure to bag plump stout fowl whether we felt like eating it or not. It wasn’t good game—the meat was stringy and redolent of sage. We needed it for the fatty drippings, which he massaged into his raw blistered ass and thighs every night. I tried to find humor in it but I suppose there was nothing funny about it. It was very unpleasant for him. He had to walk with his legs spread far apart for a week straight.

He unsheathes his blade and starts hacking away at a bunch of agave plants. He smashes the stalks beneath a rock and collects the pulp into a tin. He drinks his fill, crawls beneath the generous shade of a low gnarled pinyon, and lays down to nap. He’s changed since the Rock. He’s shut-in on himself, silent and secretive. He’s troubled, inattentive, disinterested, and distracted. As long as I’ve known him, he’s been a marvel of strength and endurance but I suppose everyone has their limits. He needs recuperation and change.

I crawl beneath the pinyon tree to his side, forage some cones, and scrape away the sweet nuts and resinous gum from deep inside. In the branches above, birds squat and twitter fretfully. It’s hot as hell but the air is therapeutic, fragrant of salvia, geranium, and columbine. Joel stirs, opens his eyes, and stares blindly into the middle distance. His mouth is drawn down and sagged in grief. My heart knifes at this look on his face and I want to comfort him so I push back his stiff dusty hair from his forehead and stroke his head. He lets me do this. “You’re really here,” he says more to himself than to me and I answer, “I’m really here.” It’s the first time I’ve heard him speak in a week, aside from the occasional yes or no.

Joel starts to reawaken the closer we get to Texas Territory. His eyes are brighter, his awareness is sharper, and the elastic returns to his step. He christens the horse Bliss. Under his firm command and gentle encouragement, Bliss thrives. He’s headstrong, alert, agile, intelligent, and curious. He demands attention from Joel by pushing his nose into his pockets or licking his face and hands. When he does this, Joel rubs his nose, strokes his head, and pats his neck. It makes me happy to see them forge this fellowship. It helps take him out of himself and takes him away from his misery.

We cross endless rolling plains, dry salt lakes, and rocky ravines till we arrive in Texas Territory. Mounted two-up on Bliss, we climb a narrow mesa till we come to an abandoned camp of collapsed baker tents. The grounds are scattered with human bones, shrunken horse pelts, and clumps of brittle hair. Joel wants to stop to explore and stretch our legs. We swing from the saddle and I trail the reins over Bliss’ head so he won’t stray. Past the tents, I come across the sun-bleached skeletons of two large dogs lying nose-to-nose, their haunches retracted in repose. Small tapered skulls of hares, prairie dogs, and badgers surround them. Joel comes over to see what I’m looking at. He wipes his sweat-slicked forehead and neck with a shemagh and says, “Two dogs.” I startle a bit because I wasn’t expecting him to speak. He continues, “I reckon one died and the other was her companion, stood guard as she laid sick and wounded, and brought her food.” He counts the skulls and says, “Twenty critters. Reckon about three weeks. He must’ve died of a broken heart not long after.”

He nudges the skeletons with his toe till he exposes a frayed dog collar with a silver whistle. He picks it up, unclips the whistle, hands it to me, and says, “Whenever you need me, blow.” It’s a very thoughtful thing because he knows I still don’t know how to whistle. He does all the whistling, like right right now. He lays his thumb and forefinger between his lips, and makes his special whistle for Bliss. Bliss answers, whinnying a genial greeting. Joel goes over, pats his muzzle, and speaks words of encouragement into his ear. I join them, and pat Bliss’ dusty neck and stiff ashy mane. Joel pitches his weight against the saddle, drapes his arms over the seat, and distractedly strokes the leather, staring-off into the distance. I ask him, “Can you really die of a broken heart?” and he answers, “I suppose.”

“So much loss it kills you?” I ask and he says, “I don’t think about love no more, Ellie. I haven’t thought about it for a long time.”

“The kind of love you had for Sarah?”

“You know I don’t like talking about the things that wring the blood outta my heart.”

I scratch Bliss’ nose and continue, “I think love’s eternal. Once you feel it, it never ends, even if that person’s long gone. You loved her more than anything and you always will.” He looks at me directly and struggles to say something but he just tells me to saddle up. He mounts Bliss and I mount-up behind him. We slowly ascend the mountain, the landscapes draped in purple haze. The only sounds are the creaking of the saddle leather and the jingling of the bits. I lean into Joel’s sweaty back, his t-shirt soaked between his shoulder blades.

“She was beautiful, inside and out,” he says, and I know he’s talking about Sarah. I listen to his voice resonate through his back and I can’t put a measure on how much I’ve missed him. Being apart from him felt like the bottom had fallen out of my world. I knew he was alive—I knew it. I knew I’d find him. I never want to be apart from him again.

He continues, “She had this way about her that made everything fun and full of light. No one understood and no one remembered. That was the worst part. The only ones who knew her are long gone, and before that, they’d forgotten. There’s no comfort in that. ‘At least you had twelve good years with her,’ they said. ‘God’s got a master plan—He’s up there waiting for her with open arms. You’ll be reunited in Heaven soon enough. She belonged to God before she ever belonged to you.’ Every bone in my body would scream when folks said those kinda things. What good was telling me? I’d heard it all before.”

I hug him tight and tell him I’m sorry and he answers, “I don’t remember much,” so I tell him it’s okay and he replies, “Telling can’t hurt me no more, Ellie.” After a long moment, he continues, “She was gone and she was never coming back. There was an emptiness and stillness that swept over everything. Fear, grief, sorrow, anger, confusion, and guilt—all mixed together. I couldn’t find purpose or meaning. There was no order or reason to anything anymore. What’d it matter if the sun and the moon came out? The world was empty. If the sun was shining, I didn’t notice it anyway. Everything in the world went dark.

“I didn’t cry. It took a long time. I felt numb. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat, couldn’t drink, couldn’t think, couldn’t stay in the house. I’d call out to her and hear nothing but the sound of my own voice coming back to me. It felt like stumbling around in the dark. I felt absolutely nothing. No tears—nothing. I felt empty. I didn’t wanna live and I didn’t wanna die. The only thing holding me to this earth was Tommy. She was the only one I could ever talk to. I used to talk it all out to her. She was too young to understand but she was always there for me. I’d wake her up from her nap and put her in my lap, and just talk to her. She always understood what I was saying. I swear, she did. She’d put her little hand in mine and everything’d be alright.

“When the feeling came back, I cried so much it felt like the tears were coming outta every pore in my body. I didn’t think it’d ever end. I’d go into the woods and run around—crying, falling down, roaring and shouting her name, killing anything that came across my path, and destroying whatever I could lay my hands on. Uprooting plants, pulling up trees, tearing up the earth. I wanted to take the whole world down with me. I’d go out looking for her and call her name till I got hoarse. Nights I’d pace the house like a caged animal till I passed-out. I was afraid of myself, afraid of what I was gonna do—a death by my own choice.

“It was long about Christmastime when my house got raided. They didn’t take much but they took an old container with her stuff: cards she’d written, old photos, some old junk jewelry she used to wear. It wasn’t worth nothing to nobody. She hadn’t done a mean or dishonest thing like that to nobody her whole life. That night felt like the darkest night in the blackest pit of Hell. My heart felt like one big hole. I couldn’t go on. I thought I’d die if I went on another day. I just wanted to forget everything. I sat down on her bed with my gun in my hand, ready to go, when I swear I heard her voice, ‘Pull yourself together, Dad.’ I figured there’d been some sorta mix-up. Maybe they’d killed the wrong child and she came back, found her way back home. I turned around expecting to see her and it was Tommy. He goes, ‘I had a feeling about you tonight, brother. Lucky for you I took the notion to come see you.’ I told him I just heard Sarah and he goes, ‘It was me, Joel. You’ve gotta quit this nonsense. She ain’t coming back.’ ‘But those were her words. I heard ’em clear.’ ‘Let her rest,’ he said. ‘She ain’t coming back. She can’t come back. Let her go.’

“That’s the last thing I remember. I came-to in his garage. He’d cleaned it out, boarded-up the windows, and put-in Mama and Daddy’s old brass bed. Our old quilts from when we were kids. I don’t remember how long I was in there—a couple days, a week, two weeks. When the doors opened, the sun was blinding. Day dawned a new-born light and life went on. I try to keep her close in other ways now. Long about a year, I stuck around till it was time to move-on and I drifted, trying to forget, till something hit.”

“Boston," I say, and he sighs deep and says, “I found out there’s some things too terrible to escape.” I tighten my arms around him and hold onto him tight. I understand why he went to Boston to try to forget about Sarah. Thing is, you can lose yourself around people. The more people there are, the more distraction there is and you can forget everything about yourself. You start to get friendly with the new people, which means learning new things about them. Eventually, the person who you’re trying to forget makes little sense around all the new people, so you have to put them away into their own little box because they no longer fit around the new people in your life, and you slowly start to forget about them. It doesn’t matter if you leave the box open or not. The memories of them become less frequent, and you end-up forgetting more and more about them. It’s just the way of the world. Your old life dies and the pain doesn’t feel as acute.

“Sometimes I feel like I’m still with her,” he says, “watching you grow, teaching you things. You’ve got the same disposition, the same laugh, the same temperament, and the same compassion. You’re more of her than she was of me.”

Losing Sarah was the end of his world but he survived. I always thought he was set in his ways but I realize he has a deep capacity for growth. Maybe he’ll even let himself fall in love again, so I ask him, “Think you’ll ever fall in love again?” and he says, “You know I like to keep a light load, my heart included. The older I get, the longer it takes for them wounds to heal. I’m an old bachelor and I’ve always intended to remain one. Being with someone else means giving-up everything for them and being okay with it. I don’t think I could bear having someone else around, someone who I’d always have to give into.”

“But I’m always around,” I say and he says my name, his voice hushed with emotion. He twists in the saddle, looks at me directly, and says, “You’re part of me. Like a leg, a heart, an arm.”

I suppose that’s what marriage feels like. Belonging to someone like a limb. I wonder if he felt the same sense of belonging with his ex-wife, so I ask him, “Was that what it was like with your ex-wife?”

He exhales one long breath and says, “Her name was Jess, Ellie. I’ve lived without her for a long time and things went on. I got home one night after work and she was gone. I’d pulled a night shift and the sun was starting to come up. I went in to kiss Sarah, and tucked her back into her bed. She was always on top of the blankets no matter how tight you tucked her in. When I went into the bedroom, all her stuff was gone—her clothes, perfume, make-up, shoes—everything. She’d even emptied the closet where she kept her winter clothes. Her car was still there. Where’d she go? How’d she get there? It didn’t matter. She was gone. Let her go, I told myself. If she wanted to come back, she’d come back. Let her go. She never came back. She left her child behind. What kinda person does that? What kinda mother leaves her child? I’d look after Sarah. She was safe with me. Let her go, I told myself. One day she’d realize what she’d done. I had to let her go. If she loved me and Sarah enough, she would’ve stuck around no matter what. Whatever the problem was, she knew I could handle it. Fight me, yell at me—I can take it. Tell me to my face. I’ll change. We’ll find a way and make it work. Some men ain’t up to being kept-up all night with a baby. That wasn’t me. I wasn’t that kind of man.

“We were young, Ellie. Too young. I remember being lonely—lonely all the time—longing for someone to hold me and just say, ‘I love you.’ We didn’t mean for it to happen. We fell in love and got carried away, got ourselves into a right mess and there wasn’t no one to blame but ourselves. I’d seen it happen before. Men who thought they loved the girl till they faced parenting and didn’t wanna raise a child, slinking-off like a cowardly coyote. ‘No one’s gonna make me marry her.’ Well, I wasn’t gonna be like that. Jess had no support and no family. Her parents were divorced, her dad was locked-up, and her folks lived way out yonder. She wanted marriage and wanted to keep the baby but we were just kids ourselves. We talked about adoption, giving Sarah to some of my folks in another territory, but she wouldn’t have it. She said she’d know where she was and she wouldn't be able to handle it.

“I tried to learn all I could before Sarah came. We worked hard, worked long hours. We saved as much money as we could. The first time I held Sarah in my arms, I promised myself she’d have the most understanding, patient, and loving parents in the world. But having kids was hard and it changed Jess. She wasn’t ready for motherhood—too many changes to her way of life. She couldn’t adjust to being on someone else’s schedule and having no choice in the matter. She bottled-up everything.

“I’ll never forget the day Sarah was born. I was at work when Jess went into labor. I got to the hospital and the first thing she said to me was, ‘That’s the first and the last.’”

“At least she had a great father,” I say. “Was she a happy child?”

“She was,” he says.

“Do you remember her first word?” I ask, and he laughs dryly and says, “Da-da. She may have been an accident but she was a damned beautiful one.”


	35. Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Five

Bliss droops under the sun, his hooves dragging in the hot sand over the vast plain. Joel and I are mounted two-up with shemaghs drawn over our faces to protect us from the burning sun and incessant dust. I doze on and off, tranquilized by Bliss’ easy gait, till Joel draws him down to a halt. What’s this? Why are we stopping?

Joel stands-up in the stirrups. His jeans are soaked in perspiration and cling to him like a second skin. He wipes the grit from his teeth with his shemagh and draws it back over his face. Bliss snuffles fear, so I follow his gaze to the horizon where I see a slowly-crawling mass shimmering under the sun. I look at it and can’t figure out what it is so I ask Joel and he says, “Supper. Hang on tight!” “What?” I ask, baffled. I grab onto his sweat-soaked waistband and he yells, “Don’t let go!”

Soon enough, the distant thunder of hundreds of hooves rolls across the distance and I realize what it is—a stampeding game herd! It barrels directly toward us, billowed in churning dust. With a broad command, Joel tosses the reins, kicks into Bliss’ flank, and spurns him into a full-on gallop, heading straight toward the stampede. Is he crazy? Has he lost his mind? I tug urgently at his shoulder and command him to wheel Bliss. He yells at me down his shoulder, “Ready your rifle!” I hope he knows what he’s doing! We surge toward the herd in a dead run. I swing-up my rifle, bouncing riotously in the saddle. Bliss’s muscles quiver beneath my thighs and hoof-tossed sand whips my face. He holds the path straight and steady under Joel’s firm command, his hooves tearing-up dust and his sides heaving breath. Joel bends forward in the saddle and rides low. He guides Bliss with his hands and lengthens him out.

The stampede approaches and I realize it’s antelope. I brace for impact and a wall of wind, sound, heat, and gaminess slams forward. I squeal pure unbridled thrill. The throttling herd parts pristinely around us and streams past. They rocket forward in a thunderous blur, their graceful heads held aloft, their necks outstretched, and their soft black eyes dilated in panicky terror. Joel whoops and hollers raucously, leaned into Bliss’ outstretched neck. He’s enjoying this immensely. I’ve never seen him so excited in my life. Bucks grunt and toss their horns, and fawns and does bleat as they stream past. I dig my heels into Bliss’ flank, lay back until I’m horizontal against his croup, and pull up my gun. “Charge!” Joel yells and I massage the trigger. Crack! The herd plunges forward in panic at my fired-off shot. An antelope springs, staggers, and collapses onto its side. The herd flies past, their legs skimming the dust. Joel leads Bliss in a wide circle and halts him at my downed kill—a large buck with palmated antlers.

We dismount and my limbs shake with adrenaline burn-off. We’re coated from head to toe in thick gritty dust—our hair’s stiff with it. Bliss stands obediently on braced legs spread well apart with his head drooped low. The silence of the desert is cut by creaking saddle leather, rising and falling with his labored breath. Black streaks of sweat course beneath his saddle blanket, and his muzzle’s flecked in foam and blood. Joel pats his neck and praises him with gentle words of encouragement while I wipe the grit from my teeth with my shemagh. We sweep my bag and examine it, a beautiful buck. A neat hole punctures its shoulder. Blood trickles its thick brittle hide and pools black in the dust. 

I unsheathe my bowie, crouch over the buck, and slash its neck. I swivel its head around to bleed it out. I glance at Joel, flashing him a satisfied smile. In my head, I figure he’s watching me with a proud smile. It was a tough kill and I fired-off a clean shot. Or I figure he’s watching me with a contented look on his face, knowing we’ll eat well for the next day or two. But when I look at him, his face is neither of these things. He’s very distressed. He stares at the antelope as if it’s a strange alien life form that’s dropped to earth from a passing spaceship. Fat cold sweat beads his brow and his lips work soundlessly. He stumbles away and pitches clumsily against Bliss’ saddle. He grips the pommel with both hands and retches noisily.

I go over to him and ask him if he’s okay. He faintly shakes his head, no. His face is pale, sickly green, and covered in blobby beads of sweat. He swallows viscerally, his face reflecting great discomfort and physical pain. I wipe the blood from my hands on my shemagh and lay a comforting hand on his back. He robustly retches—one, two, three times—though he brings nothing up. We wait for it to pass and we mount with the antelope. It smells awful but so what. It’s food.

We ride a couple hours and make camp on a large flat outcropping over a chain of lakes backed into a crescent-shaped clearing. I field dress the antelope and Joel rubs-down Bliss’ sweat caked matted hide. The sun starts to set and casts the glassy water in jewel-toned shades of dazzling luminosity. Hummingbirds skim the lake’s breezeless surface.

I roast the antelope steaks over green wood dropped into the fire. While it cooks, we massage our dust-cracked lips and hands with the fatty drippings. A large moon breaks over the mountain edges and floods the lake. Joel sighs deep, his breath catching in his chest. That sigh dragged-up something deep so I look at him. Dust coats his hair, and settles deep into the wrinkles fanning his forehead and eyes. A cool breeze stirs and he rolls down his shirtsleeves, buttons the frayed cuffs at his wrists, and turns up his collar. 

“That view,” I say to break the silence and he answers, “I knew you’d like it out here. I always wanted you to see this country.”

“There’s nothing like it back East,” I say and something catches my eye at the stream’s edge. It’s a large jackrabbit, its long ears alert and twitching. It hops onto the graveled bar and looks for a crossing over the sweep of water but it leaps, and lands right in the middle with a loud splash. I laugh because I find this very funny. I think anyone would. I glance at Joel and he’s not laughing but he returns my look with a twitching smile. The jackrabbit shakes its hind feet angrily and hops away, and I laugh even harder. After I stop laughing, Joel cradles his fist in his free hand and slowly cracks his knuckles, one by one. I feel great heaviness coming off him. He says, “You must’ve suffered so much coming back for me,” and I respond, “Not at all. You must’ve suffered so much not knowing where I was or if I was even still alive. You must’ve feared for my life.”

I know him well enough to know he’s working-up the nerve to say something and he’s doing it in the dark so it must be important. Fact is, the dark is the only time he can tell me all the things he needs to get off his chest because the darkness conceals all the emotions in his face. He doesn’t have to look me in the eye. I worry he’ll lose the nerve, so I ask him, “What is it, Joel?” and he says, “There’s some things I gotta say to you.” Here we go. “What is it?” I ask and he says, “I ain’t guilty but I ain’t blameless. That first day back in Jackson when you asked me if everything I said about the Fireflies was true, I looked into your eyes and saw a blind trust I truly did not deserve. I reckon that first one got me in too deep. I hate digging myself deeper and deeper into lies. I hate having a bad name hung on my shoulders. It felt wretched. I’ve never been no good at deceiving. It goes against my grain. I ain’t slick enough. I knew you’d hate me but I prayed you’d understand.”

“I knew,” I say. “I knew without being told.”

“I figured you suspected it,” he continues. “I knew you were trying to read my thoughts. I saw it in your eyes—the agony of doubt. I figured you could read it on my face.” He exhales one long breath and continues, “I don’t blame you for thinking what you did. Can’t say I expected anything less. I’ve done some things I’ve regretted but I’ve never told a lie when the truth would’ve done better. Shining a bright light into pitch-black never does a damn bit of good. You end-up seeing even less than you did before.

“You know I always told the truth and expressed my feelings as directly as I could. It wasn’t always the polite way and maybe it wasn’t always the best way, but it was the only way I knew. Well, I haven’t changed. I’ve still got my stubborn notions. I can’t hide the truth when I’m thinking the opposite and I can’t make anyone believe it. I can’t change—this is who I am. I do what I know is right, regardless of the consequences. When I left you behind in Jackson, I didn’t mean to hurt you. When my mind’s set on something, I don’t look nowhere else but straight ahead. I did it. It had to be done. I had to keep an eye on Tommy. She was the only way in.” I realize ‘she’ means Dawn so I ask, “Not ‘cause you loved her?” and he scoffs, and says, “I looked into her eyes and saw a bottomless pit. There was nothing there. I knew you were thinking I was taking a shine to her and running away from my responsibilities, but I figured you knew better ‘cause I’ve never given you those signs before.”

“She told me you were getting married,” I say. He scoffs and says, “She was leading you down the wrong trail.” I take a moment to think about this. I didn’t think it was a lie because I was in a bad spot. My pride and vanity was injured. I was consumed with jealousy and didn’t know how to handle it. I think back to all the things Joel said about her at Jackson and realize he was trying to tell me without coming out and saying it. “I’m mighty sorry, Ellie,” he continues. “I’m begging your forgiveness. The things you sacrifice everything for never quite turn out how you imagine, yeah?”

“I forgive you, Joel.”

“I’m thanking you. If I expected to keep you safe, I couldn’t temper my actions with mercy. Can’t depend on the law—you’ve seen it yourself. Well, it’s done. I can’t take it back even if I wanted to. If there was a way to do it without hurting nobody, I would’ve eagerly done it. Force has to be fought with force.” He exhales one long breath, looks at me directly, and says, “From now on, I’m giving you my word. It was the first time I spoke a false word to you and it’ll be my last. What I know, you know.”

“What I know, you know,” I repeat and I’m hit with the understanding he’s changed greatly. He never asks for forgiveness and he rarely makes promises. He never apologizes for his actions because he believes his actions are always right. I supposed I’ve changed, too, and I wonder if he sees me the same way. I suppose it’s my turn to apologize so I say, “I should’ve known better than to think what I did. I know you better than that. I have no excuses. I was jealous. It was the first time I felt it and I didn’t know how to control it. I was obsessed with possessiveness—possessiveness of you. The same with your brother.”

“I reckon,” he says and I ask him, “How did you know?”

“How any man knows anything,” he says. “I know you. I know your face. The change in your manner when he was around. I wasn’t trying to pry into your affairs but I couldn’t help noticing things—things you were keeping from me. You weren’t fooling me none. I knew something was up. I suspected it for a long time but I didn’t wanna believe it. There was a lotta common talk and I’d been hearing it.”

We both stare into the fire. A light breeze ruffles the lake and the surface shimmers the starry reflections of the sky above. After a long moment, he says, “I’ve gotten on in my years, watched you grow from a child. I reckon we know each other from the ground up, yeah? I got so used to seeing you every day, I forgot time’s made a young woman outta you.”

I laugh dryly and say, “I feel the same,” and he says, “You ain’t. You’re wise with the wisdom of hard trails. I used to have to explain everything to you but now you know by intuition. You’ve got a strength of will and an unwavering conviction. You can do everything I can and a whole mess I can’t. Through all our suffering, my devotion to you has grown. My family’s long gone. I’m alone in this world but you. You’re all I’ve got.” He rolls up his sleeve, takes-off his watch, and holds it in his hand. “Back in the Old World, the Native Americans had a ceremony for the bonding of kindred spirits. Brothers, sisters, warriors, tenderfoots—all equal as one. They exchanged everything they owned—food, water, horses, clothes, rifles, and bows.” He takes my arm, draws it across his lap, lays his watch over my wrist, and fastens it on. Then he hands me his rifle and his revolver. I want to honor my role in the ceremony so I hand him my .45 pistol and my AR-15. Then I hand him my silver whistle and say, “All I have belongs to you.”

“Reckon you still want my company?” he asks so I ask, “Why not?”

“I left you behind once before. I understand if you’re worried it could happen again.”

“Maybe,” I say. “But the next time it happens, I’m sure you’ll give me fair warning to spare your guilty conscience.” We share a dumb little laugh and stare into the fire.

I’m happy to finally have the truth laid bare but it’s bittersweet. Our old life is over. We’ll never feel or act the same way around each other again with all these acknowledgments between us. At the same time, I understand there are things he’ll never tell me about his old life so things will always feel unsettled with him. I suppose it’ll always be like this with someone like him. There are things I can’t tell him, either. I can't tell him I love him even though I’ve wanted to tell him for a long, long time. But I can’t use that word with him—love. I really want to tell him so I try to think of another way to say it and I pray it comes out alright. Here we go. “You knew my biggest fear,” I say. “I was afraid of being alone. It took me a long time but I’m over it,” and he responds, “Solitude’s deep waters. Small boats don’t ride it well.”

“I have another fear,” I say and look at him directly. “I’m afraid of losing you. It’d be more terrible than anything else in this world. I wouldn’t survive it. It’d be like the bottom falling out of the world and I’d fall with it. When you left me in Jackson, I thought, this is it. This is the end. I’ll never be able to love anyone again.”

He exhales brightly and draws his knuckles over his mouth. He doesn’t move nor speak for a long time. When he finally does, he says, “You know I can be as strong and brave as I want. It’s not for my own sake I feel a cold heavy dread when trouble comes for us with sharpened knives and drawn guns, or when we’re down to our last drop of water or our last crumb. It’s for you—for your care—a terrible responsibility that comes in taking care of you. I always feared the day my sight, nerve, and muscle no longer served their proper roles when called upon. Failure after keeping you safe. I felt my strength drain away and I wasn’t able to protect you. It’s primal. It’s too deeply rooted to understand it. I just obey it. I felt no different than a weak useless thing, an awful example of what God never intended.”

His body is still but I feel his muscles gathering up, and a moment later, big glistening tears roll silently down his cheeks and dissolve into his beard. He makes no attempt to brush them away. Why’s he crying? He’s a grown man who knows the answers to every question in this world, including matters such as life and death, love and hate, and war and peace. He must feel completely overwhelmed to cry.

He covers his face with his hands and his shoulders shake with silent sobs. It’s terrible. It’s terrible to see him cry. I set myself down between his legs and sit back on my heels. I press my hands against his, laid over his face. His tears are contagious so I start to cry, too. “Don’t cry, Joel,” I say, my voice soft with tears. “Please don’t cry. You’ll make me cry, too.”

He takes my hands in his and squeezes them tight. I look down and see mine swallowed in his big hairy hands and it’s the only thing holding me to this world. I move in closer and slip my body against him, and say, “Please don’t cry.” He lays his hand over my cheek and I look up at him. I expect to see his mouth down-turned in grief and his eyes weighted with deep sadness but I’m wrong. I’m very wrong. His eyes smolder anger, black with recalled trauma. He chokes back impotent virulent rage, his throat bunched tight and his muscles trembling, and he says, “Here on earth, we’ll never be separated again,” his voice hushed in cold rage. “I’ll wage war with this wicked world to find you. Destroy whatever stands in the way.”


	36. Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Six

“End of the trail,” Joel says. He leads Bliss from the crumbled asphalt road to a modest two-story ranch house dilapidated in weather and the passage of time. It’s one of the only houses still standing on the winding rural Travis County road we took to get here.

He sets Bliss to a halt in front of the house and we dismount. I throw the reins over Bliss’ neck and follow him to a large apple tree in the front yard. Some of the surrounding trees are scorched and dead but this one still stands. The burnished sunset light plays across its golden leaves. He looks up at its mighty limbs, shingled in lichen and peppered in woodpecker bores. He traces ‘SM’ carved deep into a knot and I realize this is for his daughter, Sarah Miller. He says, “For her tenth birthday, I bought her a folding hunter’s knife, and she ran outside and carved her initials. We had a rope swing rigged up. Right there.” He points to a sturdy bough scarred with grooves. “She’d get on that swing after supper and stay till I dragged her in for bedtime.” He gestures at a scored notch at the bottom of the trunk and says, “One night, she climbed up to the top and wouldn’t come down till I took-out my ax and started swinging!” He laughs and I laugh along, picturing this. “Early spring, everything was in full bloom, white as snow. Mornings, the whole house smelled like sweet blossoms. At dusk you heard the bees buzzing from the windows. In the fall when the apples came along, they’d plop down softly in the middle of the night.”

I notice some browned apples in the knee-high grass and start to gather a couple for Bliss. When I look up, Joel’s gone. I look around the front yard and the sides of the house but I can’t find him, so I walk to the backyard where I find him in a far corner beneath a cluster of sweetgum trees. He’s kneeling in the grass and ripping-up handfuls. I get closer and see he’s clearing away a rough-chipped granite slab hand-etched ‘Beloved.’ I suppose it must be Sarah’s grave marker. It’s a nice place to rest, to rest in the same backyard where she had happy memories. He unsheathes his knife and scrapes old dried bird droppings.

At Jackson, Gold would always leave a stone on the graves of the dead. He said it was a gesture of remembrance, how the Jews memorialized their dead. I never asked him the significance. I didn’t need to. I thought it was a beautiful way to bear witness. With that in mind, I wander around the yard looking for a nice stone to leave on her grave. I can tell this was a nice home before the Critical. A nice place to raise a family and a nice place to come home to at night. Joel was very lucky to have this.

I find a nice stone and go back over to Sarah’s grave. Chilled evening air sweeps-in, rustling the leaves. I kneel at Joel’s side, resting my bottom over my heels. I want to look at him but I can’t. I wouldn’t be able to bear seeing the pain on his face—a father kneeling over his child’s grave. No father should have to do this. I set down the stone but before I can take my hand away, he covers mine with his. I suppose he’s touched by my gesture. I look at him, expecting him to be appreciative but I’m wrong. His face is drawn in pain. He opens his mouth twice to speak but the words die in small gasps. “It ain’t—” he says, and it’s all he manages to say.

Shame washes over me and flushes my cheeks. I should’ve asked before imposing my rites. Death’s so personal and I was being presumptuous. He probably thought my gesture was disrespectful, like I was leaving something dirty on his daughter’s grave. I suppose it’s why people leave flowers for the dead. No one can mistake flowers for being a bad thing. Now what? This is where a smarter stronger woman would put an arm around him, whisper soothing words of comfort, and bring him inside. Then she’d sit him down by the fire and make him his favorite brew-up. But I can’t do this because I’m not this kind of woman and he’s not that kind of man. I feel his whole body heavy and stiff with pain. A long moment passes before he’s able to speak, and when he does, it’s not what I’m expecting. “I’mma tell you a story, Ellie,” he says. “This story happened to me. I kept it from you all these years. Until now, I never told nobody. Why should I lie? I’mma tell you the truth.

“I don’t remember how we got there. Someone was driving. Me or Tommy. It doesn’t matter. Sarah couldn’t walk. I picked her up and carried her. Tommy held ’em back. We thought we got away but we ran into the military. I begged for mercy, begged for my life. I reckoned he had kids of his own. He looked the right age and type. It didn’t matter. He had orders to shoot. Tommy popped him off but she was already dying. I took her in my arms and she died. She died in my arms. She took her last breath in my arms with her face to the sky and her eyes open. Every minute of every day I spend thinking about how I could’ve saved her but I have no one to blame but myself.

“Maybe it wasn’t her. Maybe I grabbed someone else’s child by mistake. But it was her. I could see it was her. Her body was warm. Her hair was soft. Her skin was soft and warm. She smelled like Sarah. I held her and rocked her in my arms till her face started to cool off. She looked calm. She looked like she was at peace. I could see her little teeth like she was smiling up at me. I know I should be grateful she died in my arms. I know. She wasn’t mutilated, raped, tortured, bitten, or kept alive in terror just to be killed later. 

“There wasn’t time to think. I felt like somebody else, like how an animal must feel—moving on instinct. There was no time to cry. I had no thought for myself. I’d do what I had to do for her and figure out the rest if I was still alive. It didn’t matter. I had to do what I knew she would’ve wanted. I had to find a hill. She always loved looking out at the world. A tree, a skyscraper, a mountain, the sea—anywhere with a nice view. It didn’t matter as long as she could see out to the edge of the world and see the sky overhead.

“I laid her head on my shoulder. Her hair was soft on my cheek. There was a full moon that night. I remember thinking, the light of my life just went out forever. There’ll never be light on this earth again. How could the moon be shining on the same place as me? It made no sense.”

Tears course my cheeks and I make no effort to wipe them away. There are no words of comfort to heal his wounds. My heart knifes over and over for him, for Sarah, for humanity, for everyone who’s lost someone or something precious for no reason at all.

“Something caught my eye,” he continues. “His boots. They were moving. The soldier who killed her. He was still alive, gurgling and moaning. ‘I killed her,’ he goes. ‘They told me to kill her. I never killed a kid before. They told me to do it.’ ‘You knew it was wrong,’ I told him. ‘I didn’t know,’ he goes and he repeated it till he was dead. It didn’t take long. I carried her to the top of a hill overlooking the road. It wasn’t where she deserved to be laid but it’d have to do. I laid her on the grass and I dug. I dug with my bare hands. If anything happened past that hill, I wouldn’t know it. There was nothing beyond that hill that night. I didn’t see anything but my own hands digging in the ground. I felt nothing, I heard nothing, I saw nothing. I was numb, moving without thinking. Like an animal. Tommy was there but I never felt more alone in my life. I didn’t feel a thing. I moved on instinct. I stayed that way for a long time.

“When I walked away from her grave, I couldn’t turn around. I wanted to take one last look. I knew I had to but I couldn’t. All I saw in my head was her standing there, asking me where I was going, asking me why I was leaving her behind. ‘Don’t leave me behind, Dad. Don’t go away. Come back and stay with me.’” He bellows, bestial and tragic, and strangles it back before it destroys him. The hair on the back of my neck and arms bristles. It’s the worst sound I’ve ever heard in my life. There’ll never be a worse sound in the world. Joel mourning his slain daughter, two decades later, bellowing like an injured beast dying alone on a lonesome field. I’ll never forget this sound of his pain laid bare, fresher and deeper now than it was then. I sob freely, his pain too great to bear in silence. He sobs quietly for a long time, his whole body shuddering, until his sadness turns to pain and confusion, and he says, “Why would God do that? Kill her like a common thing. Why would He do that to her? Why would He do that to me? She was good. She was a good girl. She did nothing bad to no one her whole life. What’d she do to deserve that? Nothing. Tell me why He did that? I needed her! She needed me! She was taken from me. Murdered like an animal.”

He sobs quietly till he takes a long shuddering breath and continues, “I felt totally empty,” his voice soft and weak with shed tears. “I didn’t wanna live but I didn’t wanna die. At a certain point, I realized there were a million horrors out there that’d be happy to show me the way to my grave. It was too easy to die. Too easy. I wanted to live but there was no reason for living. Till you came along.”

I swallow my tears and say, “You may have lost a child, but you saved one. You saved me.”

He wraps his arm around me, pulls me close, and holds onto me tight. We stay like that for a long, long time.

END OF PLACES UNKNOWN

ACT III OF THE GREAT BEYOND

BY ELSIE GLASS


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